Our Fifth Son
by WhiteFangofWar
Summary: Even the Blade of Tokyo cannot always remain strong. Even the strongest blade can stress and fracture. SMTIV, Post-Neutral Ending, Flynn x Isabeau. R&R.
1. Part 1 - Human

**Disc: **I do not own any Megami Tensei characters.

* * *

**Our Fifth Son**

* * *

_Part 1 - Human_

* * *

The slanted roof of the Golden Gal was splendid, and doubly so for one who had experienced Tokyo's long dark and climbed up there before. Back then, the old pub had merely been a perch, yet another platform of rusted dead metal from which one could spot demons or other passerby, to be used and discarded like all the other abandoned buildings in Tokyo.

Now, in the light of day you could see the entirely of the Shinjuku district, from the sparkling rivers of the National park where the Kagome Tower had once loomed all the way over to the train station. Past that, the taller towers of the government district blocked any chance of seeing the smaller park in the northern end, but Isabeau knew it was there. There, and partially restored to what she'd been told was it's former glory. Just as the Golden Gal itself might one day be.

Even if it was not the roof of a castle overlooking a grand kingdom such as Mikado had been, she still considered it the best view in the district, the only place where you could see all the places where the changes Tokyo's people had made were readily visible. The perfect spot to get away from it all, to see one's dreams in the open sky and reminisce on the recent past.

Though at the moment, the other person she shared the roof with did not seem to think of it that way.

From side to side, from rest to upraised his samurai sword danced through the bright morning air, cleaving it with a force she felt unbecoming for mere practise. To the untrained eye, the young black-haired man in the blue coat was working his thin blade through a dazzling routine offering strong hints to the deadliness of his technique in battle. To most samurai, that would indeed be a most accurate assessment of both the routine and the man.

Isabeau, however...

She had been his friend from the start, and she could tell. Reputation both deserved and hyperbolic did not sway her professional eye watching the man who had become the Blade of Tokyo forge up the steep slant of the roof, as if learning to fight in a strong wind current, the aggressiveness and swiftness of his cuts reminding her more of Walter than himself With anyone else, she would have brought such a peril up and asked them to stop before they hurt themselves.

She wasn't worried about that with this one. But she still would have preferred him to stop, so that she could cease wondering just how long that anger warping his swordsmanship might last. After several breaths, he did just that, sheathing his blade and turning, his piercing emerald eyes grimmer than usual. The anger had abated. It was not gone.

"Hoy. So you've heard, Isabeau", Flynn acknowledged in a tone reflecting his face.

"Kasumajiri", she echoed, still frantically marshaling her thoughts on the matter. As usual in their sparring sessions, Flynn had caught her off guard, giving her no time to think things through.

Kasumajiri. Despite their best efforts to remain knowledgeable of the people under their care, they were not even close to knowing the names of every person in Tokyo or from Mikado under their protection. Kasumajiri, however, was a name neither of them would forget. A demon hunter native to Shinjuku, and one of the best before Mikado's samurai had come here. A wisecracker who made up for it with great dexterity when the fighting started, he had been one of the first to join the cause when Flynn had first began the lengthy quest of becoming the 'hero of Tokyo'. If Isabeau had somehow been able to forget her annoyance when the helmeted warrior had hit on her at their first meeting, she still would not forget the number of battles he'd contributed to since then, nor the lives he'd saved.

And now he was gone. "His family", Flynn sighed. "Denounced me in full view of everyone this morning. His wife was screaming and crying, wishing aloud that I'd never come here. She said we should have wiped out the Ashura-Kai from the start."

"That is hardly fair", she rebutted, climbing up to her friend's perch and sitting. So many times now they had seen people's reactions to the deaths of friends and relatives by demons or others. It never got any easier to bear.

"I know. I promised a new hope for everyone, and instead their loved one dies because of me. Not fair at all."

Just like that, her initial sympathy was out like a light. "Tell me", she began carefully, "just what is it that makes men into such complete fools at times? Is it something in the water?"

Flynn nearly sat up in anger, though she knew he would never truly harm her. Perhaps that was why he was the only one she now felt at ease speaking honestly with. Also, because he was smarter than most- he caught onto what she truly meant almost immediately, and resumed his seat on the lip of the roof.

"Kasumajiri joined the mission because he _believed_ in me. He had faith that I would protect all the hunters and samurai who went with me!"

"His family is emotional right now", Isabeau countered in equal temper. "As a hunter, he risked his life every day fighting demons, do you _really_ think they hadn't realized something like this might happen?!"

Cut to the heart, he lay back. "Killed by demons, yes. Killed by humans? Shot in the back as he attempted to negotiate a ceasefire?"

"Dead is dead", she said harshly. "And I don't think you could find anyone else who thinks Tokyo is more dangerous now than it was before we freed Masakado and dispelled the Firmament."

He rose again, his distinctive black ponytail drooping as if echoing his mood. "That doesn't change the fact that we caused this situation. We're _losing_ people, Isabeau. Every single day, someone dies from a demon attack or the Ashura-Kai, or the Ring on one of their crazy killing sprees. I can't stop it from happening. I'm the Blade of Tokyo, everyone's hero... and I'm powerless."

For a while she could think of nothing to say. These bouts of self-pity had happened before, but this was the most depressed she had ever seen her friend. When she had been despairing at the forces racing to tear their world apart, he had been strong. When impossible tasks lay before them, it was always him, not her, who had risen to the challenge. When their comrades had split apart over ideological differences, Flynn had made an affirmative choice, while she had abstained out of indecision and fear.

But even the greatest man alive could not remain strong forever. _Time for me to start earning my keep_, she told herself firmly. While they had both worked tirelessly to revive Masakado and save everyone from the war between angels and demons, there was no question that Flynn had carried the heavier load, done more of the grunt work than she, and the work in question involved hundreds of battles to the death with demons large and small. It was _his_ name the people praised as the champion of Tokyo, not hers. Some of the women in Mikado would have said that all that was only fitting for a man, to which Isabeau might have slapped them. Men only earned her contempt when they acted like arrogant fools, and Flynn, to her knowledge, was one of the few men who was not such a fool... well, most of the time...

"You have changed", she said stiffly, for once cursing her formal Luxuror upbringing. Uncouth and vulgar as Walter and Flynn sounded to her at times, their language got to the point more quickly. "I can see that much. When you left us, something like this didn't bother you at all."

"That... was before everyone in Tokyo placed their hopes in me. In my strength, _my_ ability to protect them."

"No." She drew closer, daring as he did to dangle both legs off the edge of the roof, and hoped they wouldn't be interrupted by a demon or some other crisis. "I never asked you what happened when you journeyed into the Expanse. We had far bigger things to worry about... but I would like to know now."

Flynn's legs descended several notches back down across the edge, and his face suddenly looked frightened. "You really want to know?"

"I do", she insisted without hesitation, brown eyes never leaving his. Surely this revelation could not be any worse that the horrors they'd witnessed in the Reverse Hills facility? Though they had both strove to find the good in it, coming from Mikado she had found Tokyo to be a land of a thousand depravities large and small.

What could one more hurt?

"Alright", he breathed out at last. "It's killing me to hold this all to myself anyway. Oh, except..."

He raised his gauntlet, holding it level with his own. "Hoy, Burroughs. You saved recordings from our time in the other worlds, right?"

The replying voice was identical to the one within Isabeau's own gauntlet. Female, and usually enthusiastic. Both of them had found the AI to be a useful and loyal helper. "Of course, master."

"Good. If I leave anything out, remind me would you?"

"Naturally. I know how unreliable human memory can be."

Flynn snickered a moment at the insult, then returned to the ashen pall he'd borne since Kasumajiri's death and pulled both legs up and to the left, so that he sat before her with them folded, locking eyes again.

"Listen well. This is what happened when the gate to the Expanse was opened."

* * *

She did listen, from start to finish. Were it anyone else, even a fellow samurai or hunter, she might have suggested he'd taken in too much of the strange alcoholic drinks widely available in Shinjuku.

But no. Bizarre and terrible sights and experiences had become part and parcel of their existence from the moment they had been chosen by the gauntlets as Prentices, and Flynn was the one man still alive that she could trust not to lie. Certainly not about something of this magnitude.

When he was done, with relatively few corrections from Burroughs, she lay back on the roof in contemplation. The ideas seemed too big to contain within her skull, and many of them hurt to handle for too long.

"Other worlds", she spoke at last to the open blue sky. The story had occupied so much time that the sun had now risen nearly to its apex, its light all the more glorious for a land that had gone without it for longer than either of them had lived. "Other _possible_ worlds, based on the decisions you make."

"And the White", Flynn reminded her urgently, as if confronting those formless beings had jarred him even more than seeing Tokyo reduced to a lifeless wasteland choked by poison. "The White who sought what they believed to be the only way out of God's system, the only way to be free of Him."

"Self-important nihilists", Burroughs' tinny voice sounded from his gauntlet in a rare show of contempt for the AI. "They have no right to terminate everyone else's fates just because they are dissatisfied with the world."

"No", Isabeau agreed after a moment, staring at her own gauntlet. By now, Flynn's AI helper would have shared all memory data of this incident with hers. Of course the two would share feelings on the matter. "They do not."

"Yet _I_ was their fifth son", Flynn reminded her coldly, refusing to stare back. "Their fifth attempt to create a destructive messiah willing to return all to nothing, once they had shown me the end results of two potential paths. _That_ is why I am strong, Isabeau. That is why I was entrusted as the strongest of us Prentices."

There it was, Isabeau could tell. That was the core of her friend's discontent. Everything else, the horrible deaths brought about by the demons, losing Tennozu and Ueno to them, the stubborn refusal of both the Ashura-Kai and the Ring of Gaea to stop attacking others, never mind actually join with them as Flynn had initially hoped they would... it was all just window dressing around one festering wound of a thought, one that grew stronger with every tragedy and setback:

_They created me. What if I was wrong? What if they are right?_

"I have trained endlessly", Flynn said hollowly. "According to Burroughs' read on my vitals, I have reached the limits of my potential."

Obligingly, the AI changed screens as Isabeau took Flynn's gauntlet into hand. A large chart of numbers was there now, indicating that her friend had indeed reached 'Level 99', the purported maximum potential for a human according to Burroughs' data. All of the other ratings for strength, vitality, magical power and the like, were also all at their highest possible reading. Isabeau considered it likely they were accurate.

"My demons are all far stronger now than even Tokyo's famed National Defence Divinities. Yet we cannot stop the war", he echoed, staring across the spread of lifeless buildings, lifeless despite all their efforts. "Humanity remains stubbornly divided. We're still killing each other, even as the demons chow down wherever I'm not there to protect people. Too, I fear that God will not remain idle forever. We have defied His will. Without the Firmament to protect us, He could destroy us all on a whim."

Having gone with him to the strange dimensional space known as the Purgatorium and nearly dying several times fighting the seemingly will-less angels there, she could only nod in confirmation. The fear had occupied her thoughts as well, though after a life spent in worship at the monastery she still clung distantly to the notion that the angels had been mistaken, that they had misinterpreted the Lord's will somehow, or that perhaps they were being hoodwinked by some celestial impostor.

That comfort did nothing to heal the injuries which Merkabah's searing light had given her on that day, just as it had Flynn. Alone, she would not have triumphed.

"I understand now", Flynn was saying harshly, looking up into the bright sky as if trying to spot some hidden enemy in the clouds. "Skins did warn me. The Firmament was not created merely to seal away the demons from the rest of the world, nor to punish its people, though it surely served those purposes as well. T'was to shield Tokyo's people from divine wrath."

As paranoid as that sounded to her ears, she had seen her friend fight enough to know that his instincts were rarely ever wrong. If he feared something, then it was probably a threat. The question was, were they ready to handle the retribution of both demon and angel-kind, along with two groups of humans seemingly intent on causing nothing but trouble before the end?

For the first time, Flynn looked like he might have answered no. A high scream flew up to them. Young. Female. Frightened for her life.

"Demon attack", Flynn growled, standing, hand reflexively drifting down to the hilt of his blade. "Or else the Ring of Gaea attacking civilians again. I promised Skins I'd be up here waiting to take his report on the mission to Kasumigaseki, wait here for him, will you?"

Her first instinct was to protest at being thought of as a mere servant, that they should go together, but the scream was still in her ears as well. This was life and death. Gender roles could wait if it meant preserving more lives... And Flynn looked determined to save this one, all shadow of his earlier weakness banished to some deep corner of the mind. "A...alright. Be careful."

"Were it only my safety in question", he murmured, spreading his arms. "This would be a child's game. Fare you well, my friend."

As if looking to demonstrate his point, he quickly jumped from the roof, dashing off in pursuit the moment he hit the pavement.

Leaving her alone, waiting. Demons would occasionally climb up here now looking for an easy meal, and she would be forced to show them the folly of that decision. "Burroughs", she whispered so quietly she wasn't sure the AI would hear. "Status check."

She watched the display on her gauntlet, lowering that arm in disgust. Only 75*. "I am weak", she said angrily, returning attention to the beautiful open sky above. Only now it seemed threatening, rather than comforting, the clouds darkening as if to rain.

"Master, that's not true. Remember that the status analysis app only measures your combat performance data and gives a computerized estimate of your overall capability. It might well be incorrect. Besides, we haven't seen a demon over 70 for days now. You are_ not_ weak."

Of course Burroughs would tell her that. If Flynn's stories were any indication, the AI was programmed to try to keep its master's spirits high with encouragement whenever appropriate. A samurai who lost the will to fight was of no more use in a combat situation than a civilian.

"I meant compared to _him_", she amended.

"That's not a fair comparison. As a male he has greater upper body strength. He himself admitted that he was gifted with greater combat prowess than most humans at a young age. Furthermore, his upbringing as a Casualry means that his muscles are more developed through years of manual labour, and he-"

"Stop", she commanded. "Just... _stop_. I've no wish to hear excuses. Switch off for now."

Alone. Truly alone, this time. The demons had learned their lesson for the moment. When she was alone, the only companion she needed was a good book, preferably a good manga. And as if responding to her thoughts, her eyes strayed over to the volume lying wedged underneath a bent piece of metal roofing so it would not fall off.

Her eyes brightened. So Flynn had taken her recommendations seriously after all. He could not devote all of his time to warfare and grief. No man could, not without becoming hard and unfeeling. But just what sort of manga had he been reading up here?

The volume was a bit thicker than most, but as usual reading it made the time seem to fly by. Not her favourite, but it was some interesting subject matter. It concerned a brewing war between two countries. One, Brittania, was a vast conquering Empire possessing a mighty military, while the other, Japan, had suffered under its subjugation so badly that both it and its destitute citizens were now referred to as mere numbers. A rebellion had formed against this, and even one of Brittania's own nobility had sought to free Japan from oppression, blessed as he was with the strange ability to control the will of others with the mere gaze of his left eye.

If she had read it looking for nothing but an uplifting escape from grim reality, she would be disappointed at the end. There were many more volumes after this one of course, but Isabeau could easily see the parallels her friend had surely noticed with their own situation. The majority of the mangas she had read were not nearly so bleak as this. She would have to recommend her favourites to him later in hope of jump-starting his spirits anew.

For now, she merely slid the book back beneath the plate. Skins should have been here by now, but Flynn had not told her exactly when it would be suitable to fear for his safety, or else go to his aid herself in the event that the Ring of Gaea had taken issue with this intrusion into what they saw as their territory.

There was no fighting it. Days of battling demons had eroded her resolve, and slowly she found herself falling into slumber beneath the cloudy sky.

* * *

"Murderer."

The clawing accusation jarred her into consciousness... or not. She had not gone to sleep in an endless white void without even a sky for context of location. And the one standing over her, insulting her, was probably not a demon. And it was certainly not Skins.

It was Flynn. Or rather, it wore his body and coat, probably an illusion.

"Bitch. Hurry up and die already, will you?"

_Definitely _not Flynn. This one had not even Casualry manners in him, and even more striking was the complete lack of colour anywhere on him. This pitiful imposter was nothing but...

_Nothing but White. _"Oh. My."

"You lost your hearing?", Not-Flynn asked impatiently as she scrambled to her feet to face him and drew her blade. "I said hurry up and die already, so that I can be born. You're killing me here."

"Your words lack meaning", she replied scornfully, absently nothing the strange way her voice carried in this white space, just as his did. "I have never slain one such as you, and I have no intention of dying... and you are _not_ _him_, so cease this ridiculous pretence."

Not-Flynn did not smile. She merely felt an undercurrent of wicked amusement not unlike particularly smug demons. "But I am. I am the true face he hides from the world. I am every thought he has buried, thinking them of no consequence. Until you die, he'll keep burying me in denial, fighting his despair for no reason. Until you die, bitch, I can't be free."

"You are the final obstacle", a new voice echoed from the other side of her. Turning, she saw four additional apparitions forming, all bearing familiar forms but pale as the first providing a lack of contrast that made them difficult to see at first. As though she needed any further confirmation of this foul-mouthed impostor's origins. "The only anchor remaining. The last crutch to be knocked away before our fifth son can fulfil the purpose he denied."

Flynn had told her of these White ones who could only borrow the forms of others to communicate. He had spoken of one who took on the form of the Abbot Hugo, another the aged bartender K. The third, who had taken on _her _form... and the fourth and oldest, who had become his tragic friend from Kiccigiorgi village, Isschar.

These were not those forms. The first, the one who had spoken to her, had now taken the bushy hair, scarf and pure face and eyes of Jonathan. The second one beside him was copying Walter's rougher looks and untamed body, but bore none of his good humour as he talked down to her, only grim solemnity.

"Even having the futility of his situation demonstrated repeatedly to him, he spurned us, and slew us in grotesque denial of the ultimate truth."

The third White spoke now, bearing the tall, hooded form of Sister Gabby, but no less grave than any of the others. Only Not-Flynn seemed to have any true passion in his words, though now even he was waiting patiently behind her for his brethren to finish.

"Soon, he will learn that the truth cannot be stifled. Mankind has only an eternity of despair and sorrow to look forward to, because they are mere tools. Even now, he leads humanity down a path of ruin. If demons do not consume and corrupt, if by some miracle all humans should learn to accept one another and live in peace, then God's will shall undo all of your work in an instant. He shall never permit any life to exist that is not dependent upon His wisdom. There is only one way for any entity to be truly free of Him."

"Return the world to nothingness", Isabeau finished scornfully. Flynn had been correct. These apparitions were insufferably self-righteous, believing that they had all the answers. "A coward's solution!"

"The only solution", the eldest White countered, and now she could make out the thin beard and long nose of her dear father on its features. Tears trailed down square eyes that were normally full of life and laughter, forever frozen upon its face just as Issachar's tears had reportedly been.

"Understand. We all were once like you, believing that we could change the world for the better. Some of us sought freedom and change, others sought preservation of the order of things. Some, like you, sought the middle road between the two sides in fear of either extreme, too weak in will to decide. In the end, all of our hopes and dreams were left naught but ash, and we realized the final truth. None of our choices matter so long as humanity is beholden to God's will."

She felt her legs take an involuntary step back. More than any of the rest, the eldest White let the strength of his own convictions shine through in his voice.

"Look upon my chosen form", it continued. "Your own beloved father, who devoted his every breath to providing for you and your mother, who always spent time with you, who never once sinned or abused his position. Yet when he spoke out against the new rulers of Mikado, even his status as a Luxuror meant nothing. You could not even be there to aid him when his purging was ordered by God's heralds, and none attempted to save him. What other solution can there possibly be for a world that would allow that fate to befall such a man of virtue?"

Another reflex action, despite knowing that this had to be a dream vision- closing her eyes in contemplation. _This_ was how the White worked, she knew from what Flynn had told her. Doubt and despair were their life's blood, if they could be properly considered to be 'alive' at all. It was impossible to say whether she might have actually been convinced by this if she had not known beforehand just how eager these five were to drive others into the same consuming despair.

"So be a good girl and die already", White Flynn finished angrily behind her. "Bring him the despair and the pain that he needs to finish what he started, so that I can _become_ him. See? There's another decision already made for you, so you don't have to. And once you're dead, you won't have to make any hard decisions at all, won't that be nice for you?"

It wasn't hard to see what he was getting at, and somehow it made her skin burn even more than the one taking the form of her late father had. "I am _not_ indecisive", she protested, wheeling to face him head-on. "I simply could not easily choose between two equally flawed causes as Jonathan and Walter did. I required time to think!"

"Of course", White Flynn remarked sarcastically- another mortal trait she felt like his older brethren had long since given up on. "That must be why, when things got tough, you fled to the Counter-Demon Force base, crying like a little _bitch_ 'cause you just didn't know what to DO until a big strong MAN showed up to take charge."

"That...no! It wasn't like that!"

She felt faint. Burning up... but foreknowledge of the White's penchant for psychological warfare halted her blind charge, and she stood up straight and simply glared daggers at the impostor. "I make my own decisions. And I _choose_ to live for as long as I can. And I should mention that is not merely because your ridiculous posturing has given me more reason to live and work to save humanity."

A chorus of sickening laughter from the four behind her answered, though as she had suspected all concept of true mirth was alien to them. Not so for White Flynn, who stepped forward and drew out a samurai blade devoid of colour and life as he was.

"Have it your way", he scoffed. "Keep on struggling endlessly. Keep on trying to preserve that empire of dirt, so that when you die, it'll be even more devastating to him. I will let you down..."

Whatever else one could say about the impostor, he had the original's quick blade. It shot out too quickly to dodge, piercing her chest and coming out the back, not deadly but icy cold to the touch.

**I WILL MAKE YOU HURT.**

Then she was rolling, rolling and tumbling and waking up to the pain of sudden impact against the edge railing. Instinct shot one arm out in time to grab the small metal trough along it and she hung there, staring down at the drop and cursing.

_Brilliant. Go to sleep on a slanted roof where any tossing and turning could throw you off the flat spot. Well done Isabeau, excellent way to show Flynn you really are a stupid girl who can't make any decisions on your... own._

She could not twist around to see, but the presence she felt obligingly flew around to face her on four wings of metallic gold feathers. Even those should not have been able to levitate such a large body, more shining armour than flesh, but she'd learned quickly that demons and angels cared little for the standard laws of physics.

"Not now", she asked halfheartedly, already knowing the most likely reason for this intruder to be here. "Intruding upon on a girl's private time?"

"It speaks, but it does not converse", the green-skinned angel replied in the same ethereal reverb of all its kind, though male and young-sounding. "I am the Archangel Paul. And I am come here to slay you in the name of the Lord, perfidious one."

* * *

A/N: So I guess people waiting for me to finish Ogre Battle: MOBQ can tell what's been distracting me now.

While far from perfect, after completing all the endings I found Shin Megami Tensei IV to be a breath of fresh air for one who had heard of but never been able to try the legendarily difficult and religious series. A dizzyingly chaotic and dark (but not 'grimdark') world for a portable where your choices truly do make the difference. I was so psyched by achieving the preferred Neutral ending at long last that I simply _had_ to write a postgame, though as you can probably tell by now this is going to be more of a journey for Isabeau than Flynn, for whom I have seen complaints that her indecision, supposed timidity and lack of resolve are somehow demeaning for women. I aim to remedy that perception here.

It will also be fairly short compared to the multi-chapter affairs I usually do. Apologies to the hardcore SMT buffs out there if I mess up a franchise reference somewhere along the line. Because as I said, I've only played SMTIV, merely researching the subject matter and characters of the previous game, Nocturne/Lucifer's Call.

Hope you enjoy it!

*- Based off Isabeau's level in the Law Route.


	2. Part 2 - Angel

2- Angel

* * *

She dropped. There was no other way- she could not defend herself in that compromised position, could not even reach her gauntlet. _Should not have turned Burroughs off, fool. _Now the AI would take a few extra seconds to boot up, during which Paul produced twin swords of light too intense to stare at for more than a moment, and eviscerated the entire roof of the Golden Gal trying to hit her.

"Pure selfishness!", she shouted up at him, more for distraction than any real hope that her words could sway him from his mission. "Your Lord seeks our deaths for imagined slights!"

"The Lord is not vindictive", Paul replied in the same flat, nearly emotionless tone as his kin in Purgatorium. "The one you call Flynn has committed great evils against Him and His children. Destroyed Mikado, His perfect paradise, and corrupted all of humanity with filth. For that, the evil one must be severely punished."

"And you are here to take it out on me?", she shook her head dismissively. "Dakini. Isis. Valkyrie."

Thankfully, Burroughs was listening and all three of the named demons appeared without her having to hit any buttons on her gauntlet. Valkyrie's shield rose quickly, blocking a ray of blue light from Paul, cast despite both his gloved hands being occupied.

"It befriends and consorts with demons and filth", Paul observed, throwing both blades as projectiles and producing two more in a flash. "It is truly corrupted beyond all repentance, as vile as the evil one."

Isis gestured, and the flying swords were gone, while Dakini charged with her own blades only to be slapped aside into a wall. "Kali. Believe what you may, servant. We have only ever sought lasting peace for humanity."

The alley was too narrow for a multi-pronged attack, she realized. Paul demonstrated this when Valkyrie and the newly-summoned Kali charged him in midair, only to find themselves too close to each other to use their swords to full effect... and it looked as though Paul was a better swordsman than either one alone. "Magic then", Isabeau grunted, raising her hands along with Isis once Valkyrie had fallen and Kali backed off, both demon and human producing torrents of rending green winds to blast Paul clear out of the area.

"I thank you." Isis, who had taught her that spell, merely gave her a comforting nod back, always the most compassionate and motherly of her current stable of demons, excepting possibly... "Burroughs, I summon Pallas Athena."

They found Paul with both arms spread, now free of his swords but conjuring a mass of equally bright light. Before any of them could act, it surged. "Its words are but honeyed lies. I shall silence it with the light of judgement!"

Then the light was everywhere around her, blinding. In her eyes, in her mouth and nose and ears trying to enter and erase her inner being. She had felt the effects of the divine 'Hama' spell before, but this version was a thousand times more potent. Only by a miracle did she break free in time, and when she vision cleared, Kali and Isis were both gone. Only Pallas Athena stood, her round shield, spear and armour nearly elegant as Paul's own shining in the light.

Athena did not wait for her command. She simply attacked, spear piercing wings until Paul's swords returned to him. "Jeanne D'arc", Isabeau whispered fitfully before charging in herself. Not her last demon. There _was_ one more remaining, but... she preferred not to use it.

At the last second before she reached him, she saw a flicker of gray light around the angel's form and ground to a halt. "STOP!", she shouted, saving Jeanne D'arc but not in time to prevent Pallas Athena from plunging her spear point into the angel's heart... and thus destroying herself with a final shriek.

It was only her and Jeanne now, both waiting patiently at the edge of the nearly untraceable barrier covering the street as Paul did the same. "Tetrakarn", Isabeau observed mildly, actually hoping that no one would hear the commotion and investigate. No normal demon hunter could match this one's power. She would not have them die for her sake. "Your repertoire of skills is quite impressive, archangel."

"It seeks mercy with compliments. Meaningless. I am a tool of the Lord."

Blond-haired Jeanne D'arc sneered beside her at that, speaking to her for the first time in quite a while. "The Lord sent me a vision once, _mademoiselle_. It led me to the flames."

Indeed, Isabeau had listened and heard Jeanne's story, just as she had learned many other things from listening to the wisdom of Kali, Dakini, Pallas Athena, Valkyrie, and especially Isis. Regardless of the mythology they had originated from, they had all come to respect her strength in return, meagre as it felt compared to that of Flynn or God. And she would not fail them now.

"I despise considering any being to be beyond saving", she told Paul firmly, watching all the while for the gray light barrier to dim and vanish completely. The archangel was waiting as well, arms folded. If she struck with magic now, he would easily dodge. "In my travels, I have come to know many demons as noble and wise as any samurai... but _you_ are like the ones that Flynn and I fought in the Purgatorium. Whatever will you might have once had was surrendered to a higher power long ago. You are nothing more than an extension of His mind."

Reflexively she took a deep breath... but no divine lightning descended to smite her despite speaking words that any in the monastery would have considered blasphemous. "You shall not slay me, archangel. Not when I know what is truly at stake here."

"It is already lost", the stocky archangel answered simply. "It was corrupted by Tokyo's manga long ago, and spread its perversions to innocents like a sickened animal, unawares of the plague of ideas it carried. Though it knew not what harm it caused, its crimes are nearly as great as the evil one's."

Jeanne actually laughed mockingly at that accusation since Isabeau still felt the situation too serious to do such a thing. Manga? Corrupt? This one's logic was every bit as alien to her as the White.

"It grieves me that you feel that way. But I shall not yield!"

The barrier flickered, and she finally released the blast of wind she'd been saving, catching the archangel as he launched his own attack and blasting him backwards into the Golden Gal. Isabeau heard glass and tables breaking in there, then the entire door frame exploded outwards as Paul burst through.

Eyes nearly closed in contrition, she lowered her blade and pursed her lips. "_Now_."

Kali's four blades descended from Paul's left as a stream of fire from Isis was blocked on his right. By the time he had turned around to deal with the multi-armed attacker, Pallas Athena had fallen from above, driving the head of her spear into his body and out again with velocity of such a descent. As a final measure, Dakini pounced from behind a derelict vehicle and drove both swords into his heart.

Paul did not cry out or show any sign of pain. He simply burst into burning white fire too brilliant to look upon directly, causing all six of them to flinch away, unable to see until the light was gone, and with it all traces of him.

"Thank you for reviving the others while I distracted him", Isabeau said after a moment waiting for some kind of final trick. Nothing came.

"Glad to, _mademoiselle_", Jeanne purred kindly behind her. "I'd not let another maiden be sacrificed in such a way as that."

"Yeah, well done there", a gruff voice called from the subway entrance. Satisfied the threat was passed, all her demons returned to her gauntlet swiftly as the wind. "Looks like ol' Flynn isn't the only one who's grown his teeth lately. And this is me sayin' it, so you know it's the truth."

Relieved, she turned to see the familiar patchwork visage of one of their oldest allies. The collection of different patches of skin stitched together into a cohesive, angular face was never exactly pleasant to behold, but she had always felt appearance was nothing to hold against someone. "Surely you might have helped, Skins?"

The man looked surprised. "This ol' body fight that thing? Not a chance. In my prime sure, but this is your struggle now."

"Flynn expects all of us to give what we can", she argued back, but in too good a mood to press it. "I take this to mean your mission to Kasumigaseki was a success?"

The threadbare man shrugged. "Guess so. Found what he wanted anyway, got away without losin' anyone to those Ring of Gaea lunatics. Just hope it was worth all the trouble. The Terminal's toast now, by the way. They blew it up. Won't be goin' back there."

That came as little shock, now that the Ring knew that their strange alliance of hunters and samurai had been using Tokyo's remaining terminals to move supplies and people around quickly. "Regardless, I am certain whatever he asked of you was worth the risk."

"We'll see", Skins offered noncommittally. "S' Hope back yet?"

"No", she admitted glumly. "Not yet. But surely Flynn must be planning to do something."

"If he can", he reminded her. "Took every bit of restraint I got to fire over the heads of those bastards when they attacked us. He keeps playing by these rules, they're gonna know. They'll hit us harder."

"He is well aware of that", she said, words more exasperation than conviction.

"Then you get him to make a decision already."

She halted, eyes wide with the shock of what she had just heard. Her skin burned anew. "_Me?!_ Why do you ask me this? I could_ never_-"

"Miss Isabeau", Skin interrupted blandly. "Jus' who are you foolin', eh? We both know he likes ya. He trusts you more than he does any of us. You were with him from the start. Maybe those other two boys he was with too. But they aren't around no more, are they now?"

The practised Luxuror upturning of the nose was not a popular gesture of hers, but this time it served its purpose well as they continued the walk towards Shinjuku station, blissfully free of demon attacks. "Hmph. He has an interesting way of showing it."

Again the eyes of her companion, one of the only parts of him that had not been surgically replaced, pierced her calm. "S' true. You've seen those huge crowds that gather for Flynn when he visited the underground cities in person. You were always beside him then, helping him out. And before then, too."

_You are the final obstacle. The last crutch to be knocked away..._

_No. _The shake of her head was barely perceptible to anyone but herself. _I cannot live my life in fear of what may come. _"Alright. Let us go find him."

"Master? Sorry to interrupt, but those statistics you requested me to track earlier? They've risen. Your overall combat rating is now 76. Congratulations."

"...Thank you, Burroughs."

"See?", Skins prodded with more vigor than his usual gruffness. "Don't be so down on yourself, girl. You're gettin' better all the time."

* * *

It would be several hours more before Flynn would return from his own mission. What had started as a mere rescue became a fight to prevent an entire horde of demons from breaching the dividing wall along the government district's north side, to which many other hunters and samurai had responded as well. Responded, and died for their people. Isabeau would later learn the total count was seven, including one of the samurai who had been a friend of her father.

Until then, she could merely wait in the station, and plan. Like it or not, Skins truly had put her on the spot to make a final decision on how she would handle things. Seeing the faces of passerby, many of them gloomy with the knowledge of the battle that had just come within a hundred meters of reaching them, did not help her mood.

_You are the final obstacle. The last anchor to sanity._

_Hurry up and die already!_

_The evil one must be punished._

_Can't make a decision, can you? Just like always. Useless!_

"I am _not _useless", she spoke aloud to no one in particular, though a nearby scavenger scuttled away from her bench. "I am not! I only require additional time to think upon a course of action!"

But she had had time to think and was no closer to an answer. _Decide. Decide, or the decision is already made for you. No decision is still a decision._

She would not consult any of her demons on this matter, not even the gentle Isis. She already knew what they would say. For demons, killing was a permanent fixture of their lives, even for the more amiable ones who did not habitually eat humans.

_Those who are too soft to kill become devoured by those who are not soft. The sheep have not the will to oppose the wolves. They cannot survive without the good shepherd who commands them. Is the Lord the only such shepherd possible, or...?_

She wished she could have been more certain, wished there was some magical answer to it all. But in the end, when Flynn finally staggered into the station covered in demon blood, she could not yet say what her approach would be. Only that it was time to _make _an approach. That much, she was certain of.

Patience remained her virtue, of course. She waited until he had cleaned and taken a drink and given further orders to all the branches of their little organization. There were drills for him to organize, scavenging runs to arrange the protection of, supplies to replenish and widows and children to comfort after the recent losses.

In the end however, she knew he would seek peaceful solitude once all his responsibilities were finally dealt with. This time, upon the gravel-strewn roof of Shinjuku station, which was now ladder-accessible owing to the new construction Mikado's masons had begun around the exterior, trying to rework the place into a proper fortress.

"I'm sorry", she called to him once he had sat down on the south edge overlooking the park. It came out as a whisper and she cursed her anxiety along with the hot flush that had already returned to her face.

"Sorry?", Flynn turned, uncertain. The same green eyes, no harder from the carnage he had just witnessed and participated in, but no softer either. The Blade of Tokyo never permitted himself much rest. Too much was riding on him. Far _too_ much, she decided inwardly. No human could endure such stress for long. "Sorry for what?"

Fighting an entire world's worth of fear and self-doubt and anxiety, she held out the torn, charred scraps of paper. "Your manga. I was attacked, and, well..."

In the space of a breath he was standing again and striding over to her, nearly shaking, eyes wide. "Who", he muttered lowly. "Who attacked you? Answer me!"

She could lie. It was on the very tip of her tongue. Just say that it was a normal demon, and all would be forgiven, and she could spare him additional stress that he certainly did not need right now.

It was almost a shame that her father had taught her better than that. She would not lie to a friend. "An angel. An angel was sent to slay me. So I slew him in self-defence."

There was more trembling in his face, and he braced himself against one of the large metal ventilation systems with his gauntlet arm for several terse moments. "Our great and magnificent Lord God", he claimed when the horrible twitching stopped, "is apparently no longer content with merely my demise."

"No", she could only say, Skins' words still ringing in her ears. "He is not. I was told that my death was sought purely as a means of punishing you for your actions in removing the Firmament. He has forgotten that it was I who first showed you this path we have walked together."

Fear. Flynn twitched inhumanly once more, and for the space of a breath she could see an entire fantasy of desires and impossible rage considered and then dismissed in an instant behind his fierce gaze.

_Isabeau I am going to build an armoured underground bomb shelter for you now so that you can be completely safe from the demons and the White and the Ashura-Kai and the Ring of Gaea and GOD and any other BASTARDS who would ever DARE try take you away from me because I can't go on living without you it hurts so much. Don't ever come out._

Anyone with a brain in their head could the flaws in that plan. Not the least of which was the fact that she would not be locked away and kept safe while other humans were struggling and dying.

In other words, _decision made_.

Just as he had often forced aside those irrational impulses, she decided to clamp down upon years of rules of chastity and prudence handed down from the monastery in Mikado, and scattered them to the wind. She would never forget those strict lessons- they would always be a part of whom she was- but neither would she be restrained from acting upon desire in a time when every living moment might be their last. Decision made.

Even his blue samurai coat felt alien to her touch, and heresy to lift off his inert body, leaving only the white undershirt beneath it. "Do you know", she asked half-jokingly, removing her own coat as well. "Just how many male demons I have encountered in our travels who attempted to persuade me to spread my legs for them?" Their words, not hers.

Flynn was motionless, unresisting of the gentle touch of her beautiful hands, unblemished as his were by a Casualry's life of manual labour but beginning to show the scars and wrinkles of a longtime sword master. "I might wager about the same as the number of female demons I have encountered who attempted to seduce me in some form or another, both dominant and submissive. Always straightforward, and always crude. Or, as Walter might have put it... _honest_."

"We are not demons, my friend." Their lips drew together and touched, and she felt her face break into open flame and knew that her words were the absolute truth. They were pouring out almost as if by themselves now, but every syllable was what she believed. As if it had all been bottled up, just waiting for the right moment. "Affection becomes worthless when given away so freely. But mine is reserved solely for you."

"And... mine for you", he admitted awkwardly after they had broken apart. Orbs of green and brown, however, seemed permanently locked in, a forever warped mirror of opposites. "This is tactically unsound. Yet... I do not care."

"Nor I", she beamed, nearly as proud with herself for finally admitting so much as she was of him. "In all my life, aside from my father, I have found no other man alive more worthy of my admiration than you. You who forged this path to freedom for us with your own strength and will, discarding the destiny the White chose for you. You... Walter... Jonathan... you made all the difficult decisions while I was sitting there pondering in the barracks, unable to make a choice. You are a pillar of support for every human in Tokyo, and I am _honoured_ to stand at your side, as your friend."

As usual, Flynn seemed embarrassed by this high praise. "But you showed me the path. I only made the decisions when forced to choose the least distasteful option. You, on the other hand, refused to be taken in by either side's propaganda, and chose to think things through instead of acting rashly for the mere sake of making a decision. Isabeau, what I mean to say is... well... I believe that _you_ should be the tactical planner for our future operations in Shinjuku, not I."

Both acting on an invisible signal they kissed once more, and then the heat in her cheeks subsided. It was not gone, merely subdued. They were _not_ demons who let base passion and desires control their entire lives, after all. That was the driving factor for so many demons, she understood silently. Either physical appetite, sexual appetite, or both combined, its pursuit to the exclusion of all else. Obsession without restraint, modesty or law, the antithesis of Mikado where her father had taught his princess at a very young age that you should not break the rules to get what you desired, and that there were some things that had to be kept to oneself until the time was right._ Of course this was back in a time when I thought boys were icky..._

"Gladly", she panted out at last. "What treasure did Skins bring back from the Counter Demon Force base that you required?"

In response, Flynn merely raised his sword arm and pushed the sleeve of his white shirt back to reveal interlocking plates of black armour wedged beneath. Plates that looked somehow familiar...

"Demonicas!", she gasped. The armour and bucket-shaped helmets used by the members of the ill-fated Counter Demon Force, and the accursed Black Samurai after them.

"Demonicas", Flynn repeated humbly, rapping on the tough plates with his other arm. "Foolish of me not to think of it earlier. Everything potentially useful from the Counter Demon Force base in Kasumigaseki has now been salvaged and brought here for us to use. I plan to have the suits repaired and repainted, of course. Too many ill memories associated with black."

"Agreed."

"They remain too few to give to all of the hunters or samurai. However, I have a plan in motion to make better use of them. I am wearing one, and I shall test it further today. If there are no problems, tomorrow I shall don the entire suit of armour and go forth alone on a trip deep into the territory controlled by the most powerful demons in Tokyo."

She frowned, and not merely because that journey would be incredibly dangerous even for the Blade of Tokyo. "To Camp Ichigaya? To what purpose? Has Fujiwara finally deduced how to shut down the Yamato Reactor portal without cutting power to the whole city?"

"No." His face had hardened once more, though the passion they had shared would always linger there. "The objective of this mission- besides thinning out the hordes- is terror. Even demons can feel fear. Most of them, anyway. I plan to slay as many of them as I possibly can before retreating, and I shall make clear, audible mention of my name several times while doing so, so that the survivors may spread the word."

"And... then?"

He lay back once more, freely allowing her to run one probing finger along his open collarbone. "From then on, whenever we send out a scavenging party or similar mission into demon-held territory, the strongest hunter or samurai among their escort shall wear a Demonica armour, and all in each group shall treat them as the leader, and defer to them as though they were actually me."

She considered it quietly. Of course that disguise wouldn't work against truly powerul demons, but against the numberless hordes who only desired an easy meal? "And my mother claimed all Casualries are dull-witted brutes. That may be the most clever thing I have ever heard you suggest. Whatever gave you such a novel idea?"

Flynn's eyes rolled back, but she could tell that he could no more lie to her than she could to him now.

"...Manga."

She giggled, fiddling the stack of ruined pages in her back pocket. "Of course. I will try find a replacement for the destroyed volume. But, what then? The Ashura-Kai still have their hostage. If we do not attack the Ring of Gaea soon as they ordered, they shall slay him."

His face fell, even several moments' pleasurable diversion unable to remove the trouble from it. "I know. But our options remain limited on that front. They are all humans."

She had re-donned her coat and boots, but now leaned down close behind him so that her lips were right by his ear. Compared to the previous trial, working up the courage for this was nothing. "As your new 'tactical advisor', I have a humble suggestion for you on how to handle this situation."

"I am listening."

"We travel to Shibuya."

"Yes."

"We go to the Hills building."

"Mm-hm."

"And we kill them."

The green orbs spread wide as grapes- this was clearly not the answer he had been expecting, and he rushed to get his own coat back on, alarmed to hear such a callous suggestion from the single most compassionate person in his life. "We cannot!"

"Yes we can." She gave a slow nod, trying and succeeding in impressing upon him just how seriously she was taking this, and just how long she had been contemplating an answer. "Spending more time around you has taught me a few things about effective decision-making, I feel. No decision is still _a_ decision."

"There had best be more to this plan", he hinted darkly, clearly shocked that she of all people would suggest such a thing.

"We have just discussed it", she replied simply, drawing close to his face. "Flynn, my friend... This is our reality. If we should choose to eradicate the Ring of Gaea as per the Ashura-Kai's demands of us, we are forced to kill hundreds, possibly thousands of humans that you have stated you wish to one day bring to our aid, and the Ashura-Kai retain their hold over us, potentially forever. If we do nothing as we have done so far, the hostage shall most certainly be slain. A human dies because of us, the same result. If we choose to assault the Ashura-Kai and attempt to save the hostage, then that may- _may-_ also result in the death of the hostage... but it also eliminates the threat of this unfortunate situation occurring ever again. Like the first time we visited the holy land Shene Duque, there _is_ no perfect choice here."

"I have extended the same invitation to the Ashura-Kai", he maintained angrily. "I shall not simply murder them, whatever evil they have done."

"Several times you have sent both groups diplomatic envoys", Isabeau agreed imploringly. "And every time, those envoys were killed, with our friend Kasumajiri being the latest of those losses. But the Ashura-Kai has been reduced to a mere fraction of its strength since the Expanse opened, only able to guard Roppongi and the Hills building. They are not fanatics like the Ring of Gaea. They are cowards. If we strike swiftly and in force, we may be able to bring them to heel without needing to kill. They also know that slaying the hostage will only make us angrier with them, so I would consider it likely they shall delay his execution until it is too late. Their own lives are of greater importance to them than their vengeance against the Ring of Gaea."

Flynn paused. Isabeau could tell he was actually mulling this over now. "You make a great deal of assumptions, and stake the hostages' life upon all of them."

"Waiting longer also puts his life in grave danger", she argued back. "And we both know our comrade well enough to know he despises being used in this way. He would rather die, though of course we shall do our very utmost to save him."

"I will not slay humans. We need everyone to work together, not fight each other!"

She spread her arms helplessly. "What humans would those be? All I can see in Shibuya is a club of arrogant demons desperate to hold onto what little power they have left by brazenly threatening the lives of the innocent, giving us no path left without suffering. We have seen for ourselves that the only way they will ever work with us is if they are brought to heel beforehand. They still believe it may be possible to return Tokyo to their control. This plan minimizes potential human deaths, as we both desire."

Flynn stared back, disbelieving. Many times such a thing had been suggested to him, but never by her and never in such well thought-out terms. Most were merely emotional Tokyo citizens who wanted payback upon their former oppressors. For this to come from her... "For one with such a warm kiss, you are shockingly cold, my friend."

He was right about that at least; she felt like her spine had transformed into ice, and even she had to recognize that this was perhaps the most insistent she'd ever been about a course of action since freeing Masakado, if then. The words had simply spilled forth from her without even needing to think much. Much like Tokyo's people, she had found her passion. The passion to make something _happen_, to snap her dear friend out of this horrible malaise she saw he'd become trapped in, and by extension all those who believed in him. She still desired to preserve life, and always would... but she wanted Flynn's cause to succeed even more than that. It was only what he deserved, for all that he had given and sacrificed. _No decision is still a decision. To make a decision is to shoulder responsibility for the outcome, good or ill._

So this is what 'bravery' felt like, she mused. How strangely close it felt to Medusa's petrification.

"To give the best possible tactical advice", she explained, blushing apologetically, "sometimes, one must make cold and logical decisions. I have noticed it is something that you do quite often whenever we battle demons or angels. But I also knew that just like me, you would be unwilling to carry through with any plan potentially resulting in human deaths, particularly those of our comrades. Not so long as you were the sole reigning authority in this group. I understand that well."

_King_, the thought came to her unbidden. All of Mikado's survivors had deferred to him now, regardless of seniority or rank, and of course the demon hunters and Tokyo's civilians had no one better to throw in with. After reading so many manga stories involving great kings, she already knew he would despise anyone calling him that. She would oblige his wish, but there the fact was, standing indisputable. _King Flynn of Shinjuku._

"Well", she told him, arms folded resolutely, "_that_ is no longer the case. I freely accept the burden of responsibility. And I can safely say that the majority of our people, the ones who placed their hope in our ability to make a better tomorrow for them, would support my decision. If you shall not carry it out, then I shall. Will you come with me?"

* * *

o


	3. Part 3 - Nothingness

3- Nothingness

* * *

From a distance, the Hills building looked stunning in the light of the new day. Much like the Roppongi building the Ashura-Kai had previously used as their headquarters in the Midtown area, the former office building was composed of more glass windows than concrete, and while decades of warfare and neglect had shattered many of them, the light reflecting off the survivors still lent it a charming glow, like a massive jewel riddled with facets.

The inside was not nearly as conducive to beauty, nor were those who now dwelled there. Though the majority of their power over Tokyo was gone along with the Firmament, Isabeau had learned later on that the Ashura-Kai had, after several days of bloody infighting, found a worthy successor to Tayama despite his never bothering to name one. This older man, Gorana Takagi, had pulled all of his remaining men back to the towering Hills building and its surrounding area, abandoning Shibuya and its people to the appetite of the demons and resulting in numerous frenzied battles as Flynn's alliance of samurai and demon hunters had worked to evacuate as many as they could to Shinjuku.

Even this consolidation had not saved their most precious resource, however. They had been unable to stop the Ring of Gaea's attack on the underground facility beneath the building, the Reverse Hills, and lacking the martial might to prevent further raids they had resorted to their most proven tactic- the taking of hostages to make other, stronger beings perform their dirty work for them.

Since then, none had attacked the building. Takagi might have been justified in thinking he had done the right thing, relying on Flynn's sensitivity to the lives of the people under his protection, and his reluctance to take a human life to ensure that the Reverse Hills could be rebuilt, and at least produce enough of the red pills to keep the immediate area demon-free.

Thus, the guards in the building's ground lobby might have been forgiven for being slow to react, for what came before them now was something completely new to them. Of all the things Mr. Takagi had told them to be on the watch for, two slender figures wearing ruby red Demonica armour were among the last.

They would not kill them all, of course. All that was required was to disarm the ones foolish enough to try and stop them from climbing to the top floors of the building, and scare the rest into letting them pass. All the same, Isabeau could feel her friend's resistance to act when one of the lobby guards loudly accosted them and drew a gun, his accent making the words sound low and harsh.

"H-hey... HEY! STOP! Whoever you guys are, this's a restricted area! Get back, or we'll shoot! I'm not jokin'!"

Then she saw Flynn's flashing sword descend, saw the man's arm fly in a spray of blood as he screamed, and knew there was no going back. They were committed, in more ways than one.

To her relief, her estimate of the Ashura-Kai's general laziness without Tayama to keep them organized proved accurate. Only twice on the way up did any of them think to summon their demon servants, and both times they were all fairly weak ones taken in long ago by the allure of the addictive red pills. Isabeau dispatched them herself, taking the small thin box that the man had used to summon them and crushing it to pieces with the added power of the armour's gauntlet.

Too, she could not help but notice the difference the armour's helmet made. While the two angled lenses were restrictive vision-wise, for her the effect on the Ashura-Kai was far more noticeable. Her hair was cramped inside the helmet just as Flynn's ponytail no doubt was. The armour concealed one's age and race and gender, and for all that the Ashura-Kai's beleaguered grunts knew, _both_ of these red samurai were unstoppable juggernauts, both equipped with a retinue of loyal demons more powerful than anything they had left. A most curious feeling of power it was, seeing the panic etched on their faces that would have been impossible to reproduce if they had known her true face and body, with even her eyes hidden by the one-way lenses.

"Run away", she advised them, being careful to keep her voice as low and throaty as she could make it to avoid suspicion that she was anything but a deadly Blade of Tokyo like Flynn. "You cannot save your master. We come only for him, and for your hostage."

Most did, no matter how many orders Takagi was squawking over the building's PA system now. It was only when they arrived on the 44th floor that signs of organized defence made themselves apparent. The strange mechanical box they had learned long ago was called an elevator made its customary musical 'ding'... and suddenly the door was perforated with fresh holes as if being slowly eaten, the din of gunfire deafeningly loud even in their helmets, dust clouding her eyes behind her lenses.

Pushing away from his spot against the wall, Flynn regarded her carefully, the helmet concealing his face as well but not his concern. "No breach?"

She checked, finding numerous gashes but nothing that had compromised the plating itself. "Nothing serious. Might you have a stratagem in mind?"

The shoulders beneath his armour shifted. "Indeed. A simple one. Stand back, please."

She saw him adjust a few things on his own gauntlet, which had been integrated right into the armour, and a familiar demon with equally thick protection was conjured, a round green faceplate obscuring all traces of its face. "Koga Saburo?"

"Well met", the demon warrior said without looking at her. "I must say, it is my very great pleasure to see you once more, young samurai. You have performed just as I had hoped you would after our first encounter, destroying Tayama's wretched influence without forgetting whom you fight to protect."

"I've gained control over all of Tayama's National Defence Divinities in addition to my own fused demons", Flynn explained without boast. "Yamato Takeru was a particularly useful ally. A pity there's only room for one of them here... but one shall do."

Koga Saburo nodded back silently and spread his arms, creating the same pale gray light she had seen Paul use just yesterday. "They are scared and desperate, the last dregs of Tayama's vile legacy. They should be required to reload their weapons in five seconds. Follow me in after that, young samurai."

Without even waiting for a signal from his new master, the large demon thrust the doors open, inviting another cacophonic hail of bullets.. bullets which would only be returned to sender for the brief period the Tetrakarn barrier remained active. In a handful of seconds it took for them to catch on, half the gunners had died by their own hands.

Taking the five free seconds to summon Isis, Isabeau followed Flynn out of the lift and into the fight already in progress. Ahead of them she could see Koga Saburo unleashing his own brutal strikes without any of the caution they had shown thus far. His left arm came down and broke the neck of a gunner trying to flee while he reloaded.

Then there was a flare of white light and she was being tossed, thrown aside by the body tackling her to one side. Koga Saburo vanished into that light with a mournful wail, and when it faded he was gone along with another handful of Ashura-Kai. The room, still laden with desks and damaged office cubicles arranged as makeshift defensive barriers, was finally clear enough that she could see all the way to the one directing them at the back of it. And the smoke still trailing from his outstretched palm.

Flynn gave bow of a silent apology for tackling her before standing, blade at the ready even as he called up two more demons she did not recognize. "Of course", he remarked at their attacker, a bit more scornful than his usual self. "I might have known. The power behind the throne... if you might still call it a throne, Mastema."

Choking down dust, she stared as well. Surely enough, the angel to which he'd referred was waiting for them with a phalanx of uniformed Ashura-Kai gunmen. He appeared completely unchanged from when they had encountered him in this very building before- long stringy black hair over dark gray skin with supernaturally blue eyes covered by a strange paper drama mask, and thin folded robes which looked to be made of the same sort of white cloth as samurai undergarments.

Back then, he'd had his fun first pretending to be their enemy, making them all fear another difficult battle was about to begin. This time, she had the sinking feeling he wouldn't let them off so easily, even if it was clear that this one held no allegiance to God. His large halo and black feathered wings remained with him still.

"Master samurai", Mastema spoke calmly as he lowered his arm, sounding just as appreciative of their attention as Koga Saburo had. "I tried to warn Mr. Takagi that the same ploy would not work a second time, but he would not listen to me. Fear and time has made a fool of another wise human, t'would seem."

"Where is your hostage?!", Flynn demanded without any such false courtesy. "If he is hurt, things will go the worse for all of you."

"Why have you come?", the strange masked angel asked back with equal authority. "I have seen no indication that the Ring of Gaea has been destroyed, or even harmed."

"You said it yourself", Isabeau told him, standing up as well and summoning Valkyrie to stand alongside Isis and Flynn's demons. "We cannot allow hostage-takers to dictate our actions, not while we have an entire population's welfare to look after."

"You have only yourselves to blame for that, dear girl. Had you done as Tayama asked, there might still be enough red pills to keep the demons at bay."

"Of course", Flynn clutched his blade tighter in the armour's gauntlet. "He would've stepped up production, yes? Taken more people for his 'farms'? I think not. Enough frivolities, Mastema. Either stand down and show us where to find Takagi and our comrade, or prepare to die once more."

"...Very well. Look behind you."

It might have sounded like a bad joke, but now that they had stopped talking she could just make out the breathing of two additional people who had not been there moments before. Without even looking, with only Isabeau's eyes to see that way for him, Flynn cursed.

Takagi was standing there in the elevator, his normally fancy clothes a mess. The last few months had taken from him all the hair left on his dull brown scalp, and he looked haggard and weary but far from beaten. He certainly held his gun and knife with the energy of someone far younger, pressing the latter into his hostage's throat even as he took aim at them. The hostage-

Sir Hope, commander of the samurai for as long as she had been alive, looked like he'd been through hell. Multiple bruises, and red-stained fractures lined up with the various gashes and tears in his formerly spotless white uniform, which was now pattered with blood. Regardless, when he saw who had come to save him he immediately regained whatever spark his long captivity had diminished. "Uhngh... Young samurai... I knew I could... rely..."

"Always, sir", she agreed, relieved to see him alive no matter how ragged his voice sounded. Despite her earlier words, she had always known that Hope's death as a direct result of their actions would cut them both to the heart. To feel nothing for him was to cease to be human. "Always. We could not allow the Ashura-Kai to use such a gambit against us a second time."

"Release him", Flynn commanded from behind her, unable to risk taking his eyes off the main threat.

Mastema said nothing, but Takagi scoffed as he stepped out of the elevator with his living shield. "And what then? You just walk out of here? You stupid fucking kids! You've ruined_ everything_!"

This close, back to back, she could hear Flynn sighing through his helmet. "We have ruined Tayama's strategy to keep Tokyo's population of demons docile with addictive drugs made from living human brain cells, yes." Seeing several of the younger henchmen gasp or boggle at his words, he let a soft chuckle drift through the large room. "Oh. Oh, did they not know about that part? My apologies Mr. Takagi. But after seeing my negotiators killed, I have come to the end of my patience with you."

"How 'bout that", the older man spat back, pressing his knife a hair closer to Hope's throat. "We got somethin' in common. I'll give ya one last chance, kid. Go now. Get outta here. Use those demons an' that fancy armour of yours an' kill the hell out of the Ring of Gaea. If not, beardo here dies, and it'll be all your fault!"

Empty bravado, Isabeau thought. Hope's beard was not even that noticeable despite being denied any type of shave for so long. "Mr. Takagi", she decided to try one last time, no longer hiding her true voice. "You have seen for yourself that there are now other ways for humans to survive in Tokyo that do not require sacrificing others in such a hideous manner. We would gladly accept all of your people as a branch of our alliance, if they would only agree to protect civilians instead of abusing them."

While Takagi was unmoved, a chorus of quiet murmurs indicated that several of the henchmen were weighing her words carefully. To them, Tayama had been practically God. Flynn gave her a red gloved thumbs up, then stepped closer to Mastema's end of the room to speak his own piece on the matter.

"In the past, Tayama has rewarded you all for your services with comparative luxury. Macca, fresh food, expensive garments, wine, women, anything... we cannot offer you nearly as much. The world is changing, in case none of you have peered outside at the sky lately and seen the rays of the sun. The honoured samurai of Mikado now work to protect its people along with Tokyo's for no monetary reward _whatsoever_. The majority of the demon hunters in the association have agreed to aid us despite a vastly reduced pay scale compared to the bounty fees that you once paid them. Why is that?"

_Because you became a hero to them, _Isabeau could not help but think. _You rekindled their hope. An idol inspiring others to greater things. Just as you have with me. I only wish that you could see it for yourself._

"Because they understand that all the luxury in the world is meaningless if it is enjoyed at the expense of letting demons devour other humans", Flynn went on, pointing one red-plated arm back towards Takagi. "_This_ man, and Tayama before him, were content to keep Tokyo's people locked away in the underground cities forevermore, eternally victims to unwilling sacrifices and untold degradation all the while. They would sacrifice all of Mikado's samurai, all of the demon hunters, and all the humans currently under our protection so long as they are able to restore their ability to produce red pills. But you do _not_ have to live that way anymore! Not if you do not wish it. We are..." He paused uncomfortably, and she saw Hope leaning closer to hear him. "We are the Blades of Tokyo, come to purge this land of demons. And we gladly accept all new recruits."

There was more confused muttering amidst Mastema's dark-lipped smirk, but it stopped when he began an astoundingly loud golf clap, drowning out all other sound. "I believe _that _was the sentiment you wished to bring across, master?"

Takagi snorted. "Heh. Thanks, Mastema. I would've done that myself, but my hands are full here. Pretty speech. I'll give ya that, kid. But it doesn't change a damn thing. We couldn't stop the demons by force even _before_ these brats opened the portal at Camp Ichigaya and quadrupled their numbers and power. And you think we can beat 'em _now_? Suicide. You two freaks might be different, but normal humans are weak. They can't go up against demons!"

More murmurs, most of it angry-sounding now, and Isabeau couldn't really blame them. "We are not alone", she felt the need to counter him. "There are many other samurai and demon hunters in our organization nearly as capable as we are."

"Who would those be? Guys like that idiot Kasumajiri?", Takagi offered in mockery, gesturing with his gun. _Pop._ "One shot in the back and he was DEAD! Or maybe you're talking about this old fart?" His other arm twitched, and Hope cried out in agony from the fresh scar it left behind on his neck. "No, girl. I can see clearly what happened here. Hardly the first time. You two got drunk on your power. You think that together, you can change the way this rotten world works. But it's all just a delusion. All you're gonna do is drag everybody else down with you! _Mastema_! No more words- kill 'em now! That's an order!"

The black angel looked apologetic, but raised both hands all the same. "As you wish... master Takagi. My apologies, young samurai."

She saw Flynn tense up, ingrained combat instincts warring against the knowledge that instant they tried to fight back, the hostage would die. Mastema's blasts brought down one of his demons first, then Isis screamed and disintegrated under the assault. "What do we do?!", she asked frantically, eager to rush Takagi but unwilling to do so until Flynn had come to the same conclusion she had. "What do we-"

She froze, helpless as several things happened too simultaneously to track. Valkyrie blocked a third blast with her shield and was left smouldering regardless. One of Flynn's demons projected another strong barrier facing Mastema.

And Hope was suddenly racing forward with new strength, _forcing_ himself into the blade at his neck no matter how Takagi tried to hold him back.

Then horror jolted adrenaline into her system and she could move again, could see her commander's eyes as they began to fade into the chilling stillness of death... and she _understood_. She charged with a shrieking cry mourning the fallen, too quick for Takagi to draw a bead on until her sword swept across that hand, severing it just as Flynn had to the very first guard, and the man screamed and dropped Hope's body.

"Disgusting", was all she could think to say as she completed the task of disarming the Ashura-Kai's leader, stomping her boot down hardon his knife arm before he could bring it up at her, and brandishing her sword to force him to the ground, instantly switching from an attitude of menace to pleading for his life over the noise of Flynn's own battle.

Commander Hope, however, made no noise at all. Hot tears welled up in her eyes, knowing even before turning what she would see. "I'm so sorry, sir. This was my doing. I encouraged him to attack."

"D...d... on't..." It seemed impossible that he could still form whispered words, much less reach up at her imploringly with tears of his own visible. "Never... worth my..."

Of course it wasn't. That was what his steel gaze had told her before- that he would much rather die than be used against the people of Mikado. "We shall make you proud, commander. On my very soul, I promise you."

"Already... have..."

Gone. His arm fell like a dying comet. _And no time to mourn him._

There was still a battle to finish, after all. Flynn had scored numerous blows with his sword, but his armour was now a flaming wreck with breaches crisscrossing everywhere, and the room was in even worse shape than that. The four National Defence Divinities had each been summoned and destroyed in turn, and now Mastema had another ball of the unblockable golden light called _Megidoloan _gathered in his hand, ready to flare out and destroy another.

"Your power has grown since last we crossed paths", the fallen angel was saying approvingly. "I might dare say you are the strongest human I have ever met. It is no mystery why the people of Tokyo call you their champion."

Too focused on staying alive for a rebuttal, Flynn merely touched his gauntlet and summoned yet another demon she had never seen before. A colossal mammalian-looking one with a thick trunk and a single wide oval eye. It gestured, trumpeting and calling upon the same mighty healing magic Jeanne D'arc had used before, allowing its master to stand straight once again.

"Yet you remain ever dependent upon your demonic allies", Mastema noted less enthusiastically. "Have they ever stopped to question the logic in purging their own kind from this land, I wonder?"

"They are my _comrades_", he replied snappishly, drawing his own gun now and taking aim- Isabeau figured the angel must have been more vulnerable to bullets than blades. "I trust their judgement."

A quiet chuckle as more magical power in the angel's left hand worked to deflect each shot into a wall or window, infuriatingly polite as he had always been. "Forgive me. I might have been more inclined to believe such a claim had you fused your human friends on a regular basis to make them more powerful... PerhapsI should attempt to perform a human fusion when we are done here. Yes... I think that I shall peel away your skin while you yet live, and transplant it onto the woman's body before either begins to decay. Or... perhaps the other way around?"

Isabeau fired now, her own shots equally ineffective until she tossed the weapon down in frustration. _Convenient for an angel fighting alongside the Ashura-Kai's grunts to be completely immune to bullets._

"Fire!", Flynn called to her desperately. He was not asking for her to attempt another volley of bullets, but for elemental magic. Though Kali had taught her some, it was a pinprick compared to the inferno he was able to conjure in the same amount of time, during which Valkyrie was destroyed in turn. Two streams of searing heat converged on black wings, warping the air so that all they saw was a flash followed by a cry of genuine pain.

Mastema was now knelt with one hand on the broken tiled floor before them, abandoned by the grunts. Though his clothes and hair showed no sign of burning, the weakness in his posture was evident enough.

"Urgh... heh. Well done, young humans. You have won the day. I look forward to seeing what sort of future you two will build with your knowledge and wisdom."

One last, brilliant flare lit up the entire room and then he was gone, just as Paul had died. Apparently, leaving a body behind was just too vulgar for angels regardless of their allegiance.

With that, the adrenaline vanished and allowed exhaustion its power over them back. No longer believing there was any danger, Flynn pried his helmet free and threw it into an empty corner. "The commander. Is he...?"

"Gone." Though helmeted, her tone conveyed her sorrow. "It was what he wished. He is with his wife now."

The young man's face darkened, but she knew his rage was not directed at her. It was for the people who had made all this necessary at all. "Then it's done. You there." This was directed at one of the charred Ashura-Kai survivors, who flinched away from the sound. "Stand up. I need for you to show me where to find this building's public address system, and how to use it."

Bleeding and rightly terrified of the Blades of Tokyo, the man stood and hobbled over to them. "The uh... the 54th floor, uh, sir. In the, uh, room... with all the cameras."

"Much appreciated. I'd prefer if you led the way up there, in case there's any of your fellows remaining that haven't gotten the message yet. You can tell them to stop shooting, yes?"

"Uh, of course, Mr... uh...?"

She nearly giggled inappropriately when she saw Flynn roll his eyes at this appellation and sigh. "Mr. Flynn will do, I suppose. Anything to smooth over the transition. But do not expect me to wear one of those fancy suits your people use. I am a _samurai_, not some decadent thug."

"Ah, but you would look so dashing", she teased him gently, already imagining her friend in such an outfit no matter how reluctant she knew he would be to it, for they both despised everything that Tayama had stood for, and she feared that particular style of outfit would always inevitably remind them of him. "A light blue shade, I should think, and a red tie to go with your shirt."

He mock-shuddered, already turning to follow their new guide. "I would much rather sweat within this Demonica all day. Stay here and intercept any newcomers from below, will you?"

"Of course. Oh, and... I thank you for listening to me."

He smiled, and might have kissed her had she not still worn her helmet. "I thank you for speaking so candidly to me, and providing a plan of action to save us. Gathering the courage to make such decisions is never easy."

"I am well aware", she joked back, glancing at Hope's body forlornly. _No. I do not regret it. This was the least terrible option. I would make the same decision again. As many times as I must. Anything to aid this wonderful person I have had the fortune of calling my comrade. He deserves a thousand staunch allies for the quest he has set for himself, but I alone shall have to suffice._

These were her thoughts as she watched Tokyo's champion depart for the next lift, his back turned. All the same, he must have been equally distracted as her by him, as he did not sense the attack coming as he had an alarming tendency to do in battle. Because Isabeau had been facing the other direction, she could see the movement out of the corner of her eye... and act without comprehension or understanding, merely instinct.

It was Takagi. Left to cower on the floor like the rest of the grunts with one hand severed and the other broken, he had recovered his gun. Pointed it towards Flynn's back as he rose-

"Look ou-"

She was already dashing forward when a force far greater than Flynn's earlier tackle slammed her down to the floor. Dazed, she looked down at herself, remembering vaguely how she had coughed on the dust cloud in the elevator. The dust which had entered through the breach she had failed to find. Smoke rose from a hole in her midriff.

Flynn was already on the ground next to her. Ripping her helmet off. Screaming her name. Yet she could not hear him. All the noise had reverted to a sudden quiet.

So quiet.

* * *

"Perfect!", White Flynn exulted over the sensation of something burning in her gut. He was right behind her friend now, waiting expectantly for his time to come. The other White never grinned, but she could sense this one's dark joy in her failing organs, the way everything was losing its colour and shape save for him.

"Perfect! It could not have gone better had I planned it! You took that bullet for him. Now he'll blame himself for your death, just as much as he will blame that Ashura-Kai wretch! Perfect!"

_no_

She could almost see the real one's face, reach out to it, touch it...

"Don't bother", the White taunted her. "Takagi kept the best gun, the best bullets, for himself. The ones that are specifically _designed_ to twist and shred human organs when they penetrate."

_never_

"You're finished, bitch. My time has come, and even sooner than I thought."

_stop_

"Now, I will be born and return the world to nothingness, as is my destiny."

_fight_

"Just give up already. Don't fight it. You're weak. You've always been weak. You can't do anything without him."

Countless bodies, all faceless crowded 'round a river shrouded in dismal orange light, a simple wooden desk at its shores strewn with papers...

_what_

"Still hanging on are you? How foo-"

"Pardon me." The new voice was deep and grave, but it was not White Flynn's. "I believe that _I_ have some urgent business with this girl first."

"Hands off old man, this one is-"

Gone. Poof. And she could truly see just where she had been carried off to.

"Your first time I believe", the white-haired old man said. Not unkindly despite a bedraggled appearance. "Beyond this place lies the lands of the dead. I am Charon, gatekeeper of the river Styx."

It took several moments to find her voice again, and when it emerged it sounded broken and cracked, like she truly had died. "You're...?"

The man shrugged as if they were merely discussing the weather, ruffling the white cape on his shoulders. "That white spectre was unpleasant guest, so I bid him farewell. I am _quite_ busy enough without those fools talking even more people into surrendering their lives so easily, since one rule which I cannot bend states that I must deal with the suicidal immediately. Fortunately, such negotiations are usually swift and simple."

"Then I am..." _No. No no no. Flynn, father, everyone... I'm sorry._

"Only if you wish to be."

That brought her up short. "Pardon?"

Charon gestured around at the piles cluttering his desk. Despite his attire, his flesh retained a faint colour and he did not seem anywhere near the mindset of the White. "The paperwork. It's enough to make a man turn over in his grave, so to speak. Ever since Tokyo was sealed away, the backlog of souls has been piling up here. I have been cutting deals with a handful of people I wish to see succeed in their endeavours in order to lessen the strain. As you can plainly see girl, I still have a fair bit of backlog to deal with."

Isabeau looked around at the gathering of formless, colourless bodies. Not merely a gathering but lines, she realized. Lines of the dead patiently waiting their turn to sail the river Styx to the other side and whatever might await them there. Were she not here personally, she might think it most amusing.

"Why me?"

Charon chuckled eerily. "You have made substantial efforts to ending the current crisis on Earth. As I said, I wish to see you succeed in your quest, even if I must bend the rules a bit. Simply pay me... hmmm... shall we say, 15,000 Macca and you may return to the world of the living. _This _time."

She could hardly believe what she was hearing. "The hallowed boatman of the river Styx demands a bribe?"

"Not a bribe, dear girl. A compensation. Money opens all doors, even here. Or... would you prefer the 3 million that I was planning to charge that other child the next time he came in here?"

"Other...?"

Charon sighed and threw up two spindly hands like spider webs. "Ah. This all must be so confusing for you, particularly one who grew up in the kingdom of Mikado with nothing but the meagre knowledge that God allowed you to know. I shall put it in simple terms; do you have 15,000 Macca or not?"

She did, and as she removed the many coins from her wallet she breathed a small thanks that she was not a frivolous spender as many women her age in Tokyo seemed to be. "There you are, sir. Permit my curiosity, whom was the other child you spoke of?"

Taking the coins, he nodded towards her respectfully, suddenly more serious. "You know him."

Of course. Of course she knew him. _That gaping hole in his chest when the Minotaur gored him... yet he returned somehow to finish the battle. At the time, we all believed he was merely strong and lucky to survive such a wound, and we quickly rushed him back to the barracks to recover..._

Meanwhile, Charon had chanted something to open a tiny black hole in the floor, which he then dumped the entire contents of her wallet into without a trace. "Yes girl, I think it might do you some good to lose that illusion. He was not perfect, as you have believed. He found himself here more than once in his long journey, only spared by the grace of my good will towards any seeking to break the cycle. Still, I think you'll agree with me; considering the numbers of powerful opponents that he has beaten, that hardly diminishes his accomplishments."

"No", she concurred after a moment. "No it does not. He remains the bravest, strongest human I have ever met. I..." Apparently, it was impossible for one to cry in the land of the dead. _And none save the dead will speak to this one. _"...I love him."

"Hm. Human reproductive instinct", the boatman observed in a sustained effort to keep his voice sounding neutral. "I pray that is not the only thing that makes you desire to return. Nor the fear of what he might become. Pay the White's moaning no heed girl, as few paths are as fixed as those self-absorbed fools wish to believe."

"I pray you speak the truth", she agreed, actually smiling now despite the grimmest of settings. It was all right. She would return. She could come back. White Flynn would never come to be. She clasped both hands and bowed formally. "You have my most sincere thanks, O gatekeeper. For this, and for other favours."

The boatman merely shrugged, but she could a wry smile beneath his white mop. "I must say, you are far more polite than that other child is. Aside from the Macca, I know that you shall repay me by reducing the net amount of human deaths in the near future. Very soon, I should reach a state approaching equilibrium in my work... and _then... then_ I shall have no need to cut underhanded deals such as this with any human soul. You do understand my meaning, girl?"

"...I do." Such a revelation might have paralysed her, left her too frightened to act just as Flynn had been on that rooftop days prior. But not now. "Wishing no offence good sir, I hope we'll not meet again."

"You will", Charon told her flatly. "Everyone does."

* * *

o


	4. Part 4 - Demon

4- Demon

* * *

"Ah. You're awake."

The sound snapped her eyes open. Not that the tone was alarming; indeed it remained as calm and gentle as remembered.

The only problem she had was that the speaker was long dead.

It all came flooding back, and not merely what had put her to sleep. This was not Charon's bleak riverbank, nor the Hills building. She had never seen this place before. Endless sand broken by pieces of broken masonry spread out in all directions under a blue sky somehow more pure than Tokyo's clearest day.

The dead man continued speaking as though nothing was wrong, keeping his back turned. "You must remember your oaths, my friend. The code is the only solid foundation one can adhere to in a fluid world."

"Jonathan...?"

Turning confirmed her suspicion, but the dead man looked surprised. "Hm? No, my name is Kiyoharu. I am the Lord's shepherd in this world. My oaths to Him, my code, are what guided me to that revered honour."

Trying to move closer, she grunted to stifle a cry of pain, confirming her injuries were still there. Her left leg felt like a score of burning nails. There was a rushing sensation in her head, something difficult to place or pin down with prior experiences.

"Mikado was the Lord's kingdom", the dead man went on. "His paradise secluded away from demons and filth. You swore an oath to protect it, did you not?"

"What? I..."

"Yet you betrayed your people, betrayed your oath. Until it is fulfilled, you have no right to call yourself a samurai."

Too much noise. Yet the endless wasteland was completely dead, silent as the grave. It was only the rushing in her head which was driving at her, making it impossible to focus. _A dream. It must be._

"In His infinite mercy, He grants you one final chance. Fulfil your vows, and save Mikado's people from the defiler. In doing this, in death, your soul may be redeemed."

Swiftly as the dead man had in all their sparring sessions, he turned so that she could at last see that his face, and more importantly his eyes were the same as the one she had known as a kind and compassionate man despite his harsh words. Those features did not slacken, did not express any malice as the dead man's blade shot into her gut.

"The time has come for you to awaken."

Blackness.

* * *

"Hoy there. You alive or what?"

This time it was instantaneous. The transition had happened so quickly that the dead man's parting words were still ringing in her ears, at first difficult to separate from the next.

The next man she'd known and believed was dead.

The environment was more familiar this time, at least. A Tokyo yet covered by the endless night brought on by Masakado's firmament. Only this one looked even the worse for wear, dozens of fires and craters lingering even in the small stretch of roads and buildings she could see. The smoke from the hideous damage rose up and obscured the ceiling further still.

"The past is dead. Mikado is dead. You'll be dead too, girl, if you don't learn to survive."

"Walter", she observed more calmly, waiting for the other boot to drop.

"Who the fuck is Walter? My name's Kenji. I'm the king of Tokyo, because I'm the strongest there is. Yeah... I can tell you're strong, too. At least if you don't let things hold you back."

"Thank you", she said, not knowing how else to reply. "I will."

"No, girl. You haven't yet. You have to let it all go. That's the only way _that_ guy'll ever respect you as an equal. That's the only way he'll ever be yours."

Optimism gradually slid away into suspicion. It wasn't hard to guess what he spoke of, and she would have none of it. "I remain a samurai, not some demon's thrall."

Back still turned, 'Kenji' shook his head in disappointment. "That kind of thinking'll just get you killed. The samurai are dead as their kingdom. As you are now, you're just waiting to be destroyed by that omnipotent bastard. Your choice, I guess. I'm a big believer in choice. I just hope you make the right one, in time."

Kenji's fast turn was not even a surprise this time, and she did not attempt to dodge Walter's sword; there was no point to remaining in this burned-out necropolis anyway.

"Wake up already, will ya?"

Blackness.

* * *

"_-have to wake up. You have to wake-"_

Sunlight drew a lost consciousness back to awareness. Sunlight, and the man-shaped shadow nearly covering it. The breeze played with her hair and she realized that they must be on a high roof.

Then she saw the expression taking over Flynn's face and forgot all questions of where they were or what she had just experienced. Nearly as striking as the tears was his own hair as he knelt down- the ponytail he'd maintained for their entire journey together was now a frayed mess dangling behind him.

"Oh, thank-", he caught himself, old reflexes from monastery teachings leaving him momentarily stalled.

"Thank whomever you had using healing magic on me?", she suggested idly once they had embraced for several moments. There was a snap of pain in her gut as counterpoint, but it felt numb and removed, like the injury should have been far worse than it was.

"Indeed. I thank Grimekhala", Flynn amended hastily and raised his sheathed sword. "And this."

Eyes straying across the rest of the roof, she pieced together the rest of the story, eyes widening as she understood more. Their Demonicas were both discarded in plates on the concrete, leaving only the white samurai undershirts and gauntlets. A fair number of blood stains interspersed with that... and a few feet past that, a single metal shell nearly the size of her thumb.

"You... cut it out of me?"

"I did", he said, refusing to leave her hard gaze. "Burroughs suggested you might respond well to fresh air, but I could see that was not enough. This truly was a miracle."

Ridiculous that the first thing to come to mind were complaints of modesty and chastity. Particularly given her confession to Charon. Yes, she could remember that now, along with everything else. _The land of the dead, the river Styx. The gatekeeper who wants us to make a better world, and two other worlds who weren't so fortunate. _"...Thank you, my friend. You saved my life. Again."

Flynn shook his head. "You saved mine first. I hope you don't mind that I became rather angry with Mr. Takagi when he shot you. He's dead."

_A human_, she thought idly. Was he a human? _A human controlled by desire who was indirectly causing the slow death of his entire species, who would not have settled for anything less than all humanity under his thumb, as it was with Tayama, and sought our deaths purely out of spite. _Despite all this knowledge, she felt strangely guilty. From the look of it, so did Flynn. _Yes, we had killed many Ashura-Kai and Gaeans before now, but only in self-defence when they attacked us in their roaming bands. Takagi was slain in a vengeful rage._

It was something they were going to have to live with, she realized heavily. Whether it was the moral thing to do or not, it _would_ have to be done. That was a part of their duty too, not merely slaying the demons and angels who attacked their people. She understood too, a large part of why the majority of Tokyo's people acted with little restraint or moral code at all. The Lord had abandoned them. The Lord had spurned them, labelled them filth, consigned them to eternal darkness underground... Even if they held to the same beliefs as Mikado's people after all that, what afterlife retribution could be worse than their daily lives?

Her body felt heavy and hard as metal, and she understood that the effects of her brief foray into Charon's realm were not limited to the physical. _I will not be careless. I will act as befits a samurai crusading to save our people from destruction, as he does... but I will also be strong. In other words, I will do all that becomes a human, a walking mass of contradictions, but beyond the judgement of demon or angel._

Fighting against the sudden weakness from blood loss, she moved one hand up around him affectionately. "Be at peace. You did what you needed to. You always do, and I will always support you. How did the rest turn out?"

He looked more embarrassed than shameful now. "Well enough. I gained access to this building's public address system, and broadcast to all of the Ashura-Kai still there or in the Reverse Hills facility. Aside from some who ran for their lives when I allowed them to, most of them have sworn allegiance to me now. They will train to become either warriors, or scavengers."

"15,000 Macca on scavengers", she wagered disdainfully, leaning back and feeling the pain dissipate. "They are cowards."

"Perhaps. But scavengers are required as well to bring us the resources we require to rebuild Shinjuku's infrastructure, and they know Tokyo's inner workings far better than we do. My only true regret is that I'm unable to convince them to call me anything except 'Boss' or 'Mr. Flynn'."

'Mr. Flynn' made her laugh even though she knew it would make her insides hurt more, and she coughed up a glob of blood after. "And the Reverse Hills?"

"It will be shut down. They had a small reserve supply of red pills I have appropriated for our use, but when that supply is gone no more will be made. I made that very clear. I plan to have the facility converted into an emergency shelter. Any demons who joined the Ashura-Kai solely for more reds, I have slain."

"Then... Shibuya will become another nest of demons like Tennozu."

"Shibuya was doomed the moment the Ashura-Kai abandoned it", Flynn said acidly. Whatever sympathy he once had for them had been burned away by Takagi's bullet. "They did _nothing_ to save its people, not even warning them to evacuate the underground. They left them all to die in the underground city, and only because_ we _chose to intervene did any humans survive at all to reach our safe haven in Shinjuku."

She knew this already, but hearing Flynn say it out loud was comforting. "Then we have truly won."

"For the time being", he agreed stiffly, staring out across the spectacular view from the rooftop, almost able to see the temple at Ginza. "There is still the Ring of Gaea for us to contend with. They are far more numerous and capable than these cowards. Their attacks become more bold. And they will not surrender no matter how many of their fellows die. Even if I were willing to begin an all-out war with them as Takagi had wished, even _if _we were victorious, the cost to our own army would be astronomical. We would be crippled."

"Then perhaps I can be of some assistance."

_That_ genuinely surprised him. She was inwardly proud to see he could still be surprised by her. "How? Do not say 'kill them' again. I will only do that when there is no other option left."

"Hardly." Slowly, carefully, she tried to stand. Again her insides burned and her left leg's joints screamed for release from the pressure, but collapsing now would send Flynn exactly the wrong message. _I am a samurai, a Blade of Tokyo, and I am sworn to serve the people 'till my dying breath. To hell with all weakness. Full speed ahead._

"You should not stand!"

"Only momentarily", she promised him, gasping, forcing another agonized step from her left leg. "Our healing magic and the Ashura-Kai's medicine may not be quite the same as a true doctor's care, but it has done well enough for me." She could stand, though still accompanied by a dull ache in her left leg and faintness in her head from lost blood.

"You are certain?"

"No", she confessed after a pause. If she did not do this now, she might never dare again. "But you have already undertaken far greater risks and sacrifices. 'Tis far past time I did the same for our cause... but thank you for standing by me. If at any moment I am on the verge of being overwhelmed in what I am about to attempt, do not hesitate to step in."

"Always."

Just as she had expected. Flynn would always be there for her, and for Tokyo, and probably always be greater than she in both strength and will. There was now exactly one thing that she could do for the cause that he could not.

So she chose to do that. "Burroughs, are you online?"

"Yes, master. Your vitals are stable now. Also, you might be interested to know that your overall combat performance rating has risen to 77, though I'd still advise you to avoid any combat until you're fully healed."

"Thank you for your concern, Burroughs. This will not involve combat."_ I hope._

They never appreciated the AI enough, she noted absently. Without that, summoning and fusing demons would be impossible, and so would their quest. Even though Burroughs was technically programmed to aid them regardless of a samurai's character or disposition, Isabeau remained inwardly grateful for her help.

"Burroughs, whenever you're ready... Initiate my gauntlet's demon summoning program. I summon Lillith."

Unsurprisingly, Flynn gasped at that name and drew his sword by instinct, alarm clouding his face. "What?! No!"

Too late. The glare of the summoning ritual faded, and suddenly they were faced with a towering skeletal demon spanning the building's rooftop, black feathers and carapace covering everything save for an obscene patch of healthy chest flesh replicating a human woman's exposed mammary glands. Above that was a thin, long-tongued face like that of a bipedal serpent, which they both considered to be entirely appropriate.

Lillith, previously known to them as lady Yuriko, and even longer before that as the Black Samurai, leered down at them and gloried in her release. "I had always known this day would come", the massive demon hissed in utter contentment. "I knew that some day, you would yield to the temptation to use my power. It is your nature as humans."

Flynn was about to make an angry retort when Lillith's _power_ washed over them, stunning both samurai into temporary silence. If anything, she was even stronger than last they had met.

"You were afraid. You mentally forbade yourself from ever summoning me", the demon went on. "But _nothing_ can be forbidden forever, and the forbidden fruit is always the sweeter, is it not?"

"I forbade myself", Isabeau found the words at last, "I refused to summon you until a time arrived that I was certain I could handle you. That time is now."

"Isabeau?", Flynn interrupted in confusion. "What is going on here? How did _you_ summon her?"

She sized up her friend closely, face flushing. It was still impossible to tell just by looking whether he had initially sided with Jonathan or Walter, and she considered it rude to pry into such a personal matter for him. Besides, both sides had their reasons, their sensible-sounding arguments in favour of one side or the other. "Her medium. Just as you were able to summon the National Defence Divinities with the mystic stones which Tayama once held, I managed to find her medium lying just outside of Camp Ichigaya some time after you entered it. I wished to find you, you see. I wanted... to try and apologize to you."

How long had it been since that fateful day when the Expanse had opened and the world gone mad? It felt like years. "There was nothing to apologize for", he protested. "I told you, both sides were in error. I merely chose the path that made more sense to me at the time, as flawed as it was."

"Whereas I could not make any meaningful decision at all", Isabeau countered with equal self-reproach. "I cowered in the barracks, hoping my dilemma would go away, only coming to Camp Ichigaya when it was far too late."

"She is _weak_", Lillith provided scornfully, that long snake tongue waggling at her in abject mockery. "Still so weak. Despite taking in so much knowledge and wisdom from books, she lacks even the strength to stand by her own convictions. Of what use is such a human?"

"We shall see", she promised defiantly, turning back to the person she had learned to always look to whenever she was lost or confused. "I found Lillith's medium, and she attacked me for the same reasons she espouses now."

"Attacked you." Flynn's face was pale.

"Yes. And I narrowly won. Knowing how powerful and untrustworthy she is, I was unwilling to summon her until now."

"And now?" Lillith actually sounded curious instead of dismissive now. She would hardly be the first demon who might admit a grudging respect for the one who defeated them, for that was the primary standard of might for many others of her kind. "What will you do now, girl?"

Flynn caught her gesture correctly, gradually, unwillingly backing off to a safe distance as she planted both feet, trying to steel herself. "I have seen your power firsthand, Lillith. No man alive can resist your unique gifts of temptation and persuasion. Even your weaker spawn, the Lillim, were able to charm three of the finest men I have ever known into complete lovestruck fools. No man who summoned you could remain your master for very long- you would quickly become _theirs_."

The massive demon bristled, as if annoyed by such flattery. "My power is merely the most carnal of all human desires. You believe that you can fare better? You, weak human girl?"

"That is what I have summoned you to find out. I ask you to assault me with your most powerful charm spell."

Flynn's reaction to this command was as predictable as it was painful to hear, but she would not relent now. _Staring into the abyss of a long-suffered fear, one cannot look back... _"Further away, please. Wishing no offence, her power over you is far greater."

The demon reared back a moment as if suspecting a trap, but eventually stroked her jagged chin plating, intrigued once more by such daring. Rightfully so; she would never have attempted such a thing before her recent encounter with Paul. Possibly even before meeting Charon.

"You have become stronger", Lillith confessed, dark nightmare jaws clacking together to see if Isabeau would flinch away in terror. "Yet you remain inferior to the child of carnage who gladly accepted my gifts, and even the pitiful missionary boy whom God chose to become His mindless puppet. If you believe that my powers cannot affect you merely because you are a woman... then you are an even greater fool than I first believed!"

Flynn did shout again, moments before the demon extended her left claw, its thinnest bladed tip flying out with sudden swiftness to tap Isabeau's exposed forehead as she braced herself. There was no pain, no piercing or blood. Nor even any sense of the powerful influence she had sought to test her own will against.

Both waited several moments until the moment became awkward. "Strange. Not nearly as powerful as I expec-"

The rooftop was gone, and with it Tokyo. A rushing river of sensory overload blocked all sight and sound and touch save what the power was stirring within her. There was no gentleness or subtlety in this manipulation as she had initially expected. This was simply a siege, a direct mental assault of a kind no other of her kind save the demon lord Lucifer could manage.

And Isabeau reeled.

_-freefreefreefreedestroydestroydestroydestroyminemineminemineminemine-_

Infinite desire. Unrelenting. Unreasoning. Hunger. _ Passion._

_-mineIwillmakethemallfreeseeeverythinguntochaosmineforeverspitetheonewhospurnedmecastmeoutofhiswarmembraceAdamAdammyAdambeminedestroy-_

Swam.

Could _think_ again, if barely. Could process the input, even if she could not begin to fight against it or regain any other sense. Fortunate, since the intruder had realized her own desires were not enough to overwhelm this particular victim, and had already started augmenting them with the victim's own emotions magnified a thousandfold with no control to hold them back.

_-manganonewillevercallmeweakagaintheywillhonourmebuildstatuesofmeandFlynnFlynnmyFlynnmineminehewillrespectmeandlovemebewithmebemineforevermineminemine-_

Unthinking, she swept one hand to knock the talon away from her forehead. There was nothing solid there to touch.

-_whyfatherwhywhywhydiefatherdidyoudiewhydidhehavetodiefatherwhydidgodtakehimfrommevengeancedestroy-_

_Desire_. Desire made it impossible to think, impossible to resist when a subconscious path opened that would grant that desire. Surrender. Simply surrender and everything she had always desired but denied to herself would be hers. Everything. Only demons could grant desires.

All of her desires but one, the mental picture of it a barrier that the intruder could not breach.

_A world without war. A world without hostile demons where humans can live in harmony._

There was an explosion in her head, and the world returned. Flynn was already at her side, holding her to keep her from falling over while Lillith retreated, holding up the intruding talon in a mood impossible for a human to place.

"What did she do?", he was demanding, self-control barely holding back his impulse to simply strike the demon down. "Isabeau, what the hell did she do to you?!"

Isabeau closed her eyes, remembering. "Uhn... s... she... she did exactly as I asked. She attempted with all of her power to charm me, to make me loyal to her ideals. It was... a very compelling experience. I understand now just how she was able to lure so many humans into joining the Ring of Gaea's cult as 'Lady Yuriko', regardless of their gender."

But Lillith sounded no less disdainful of her. "You insult their faith in me. Nothing of the sort was required to make them desire to be free of Tayama's yoke. I merely granted that collective desire in return for their eternal allegiance."

"Of course", she agreed, standing up to the demon triumphantly, regardless of the size difference or how her leg burned. Her hair had gone uncut for longer than usual due to a lack of time in which to prune it with her blade as usual, and now it hung heavily at her back and around the corners of her vision. She did not brush it aside. "I understand, now. That is your message to us, your 'wisdom'. Allegiance with demons can grant you any desire, correct? In exchange for my soul, all of my desires can be granted... save one."

Now Lillith looked miffed, descending down closer, slender insect legs folding up so that she was only twice their height. "_That_ one is a false desire imprinted on you by Mikado's dogma. Of what worth is securing peace for others who cannot fend for themselves? The weak deserve their fate."

"The mantra of the Gaeans", Flynn sneered back when his friend was too occupied with the rush of memory to provide a suitable retort. "But you are wrong, Lillith. Mikado has taught us that the Unclean Ones were evil, that they deserved their punishment for past sins. Wishing to help them find better lives? _That_ is merely something that I began to desire once I saw how desperate and helpless they were."

The long insect claws folded up as well, the equivalent of an exasperated sigh. "Then your will is as weak as theirs. In any case, you are too late. The Expanse has opened. Without the Firmament, the demons within are free to spread to all the lands beyond Tokyo. No matter what you do now, humanity will have to either endure and become stronger or be destroyed, as was my original intent."

Exhausted, her eyes had drifted shut again while they were talking, and when they opened, Flynn's sword was at Lillith's throat. "The intent for which your vile lord sacrificed Walter. For which you would see the deaths of millions of humans who only wish to be left in peace!"

"You self-righteous bas-"

Seeing things escalate quickly, Isabeau deliberately dropped to one knee to head the fight off before it began. Flynn was right of course, but they needed Lillith's help still. "Then I suppose it doesn't truly matter", she suggested meekly, "if you were to aid us in our own goal? For if you are correct and humans are doomed, then there is no need for you to guide our fates to that end any longer."

The faint glimmer in those inhuman blue slits told her all she needed to know. Lillith hadn't just been projecting powerful desires into her mind in their brief mental contact. She had also been able to read memories, for how else could she determine a victims innermost desires, distort them into a deranged obsessions and then offer demonic aid in granting them?

And, she silently added, the contact had not been a one-way channel. By fighting the stream, she had seen much, though only in vague flashes. _Lillith... you weren't always this way, were you? No. You were a beautiful human once too, cast out of paradise and spurned by God as a source of great evil. You would give up everything to consummate your passion for Adam. No matter how long you live, no matter how many men you bewitch and befoul with demon taint, Adam is the one that you truly long for._

Learning these hidden facts about Lillith had changed her perspective on a great many things. Knowledge always changed a person. But it could not be unlearned, and she would not desire to.

"I might have underestimated you. All that you have done since the Firmament was removed is in the pursuit of creating more warriors like yourselves. Like me, you seek to make humanity stronger, while Tayama sought to keep it weak and beholden to him alone."

"Your approval makes me doubt my path even more than the White did", Flynn growled, refusing to sheath his weapon.

Then Isabeau was beside him tapping her gauntlet. "It doesn't matter. The point is, I've now proven my resolve to you. I propose to you that our inner strength is greater than yours, Lillith, and the same goes for any member of your Ring of Gaea you would care to name. By the rules of your own twisted creed, because _we_ are stronger than you, you _will_ aid us. Or be destroyed."

The demon shifted in reluctance, hesitating. Unsurprising. "Not 'us'", she amended defiantly, stretching out a nightmare talon at Flynn's grave face. "Not _him_. His great potential as a ruler is tainted by the poison of compassion. He is too inflexible, unwilling to face the dark realities of a changing world."

_We will see what the Ashura-Kai have to say about that. _She kept the thought from her face. "Then I will only ask one more thing of you, then you are free to do as you will."

"...Name it."

Widening her arms for Flynn to give her breathing room once more, she looked up at the lean demonic face squarely in the eye, unblinking. "Repeat after me: People of the Ring of Gaea. I am Lady Yuriko, your founder and master. But I have deceived you. In truth, I am actually the demon called Lillith. I hereby relinquish all of my authority to the human called Flynn, making him the new master of the Ring of Gaea." Stopping the recital, she blinked at Lillith in confusion. "I never had the time to check if you had some means of bonding the cultists to you beyond mere 'charisma'."

"Though you _have_ spoken to Izana about me at Ginza", Lillith noted wryly. Then she laughed aloud, sinister amusement echoing across the dead cityscape, doubtless frightening many of the Ashura-Kai. "So be it, then. We shall see if this one has the strength to follow in my footsteps."

Isabeau saw Flynn looked ready to shout in protest again, but he reined himself in at the last second seeing her own gaze upon his. There was no need for words. In that brief moment, their thoughts were as one:

_Let Lillith continue to believe in her fantasies about plagues of demons making humanity stronger through trial and suffering. When the time is right, this plague **will** end. **We** will end it._

_Together._

* * *

To Be Concluded


	5. Part 5 - Blade of Tokyo

5- Blade of Tokyo

* * *

It would be a long wait before the right opportunity presented itself. Even in their brief absence, Shinjuku station had once more come under attack, resulting in more lives lost and more damage done- Isabeau stopped and gaped when she saw the station's gravel roof caved in like some giant had stepped on it, including the very space where she had spoken to Flynn the day before. The tide was rising, she could not help but think. Soon, they would all be swept away. Devoured. Dead.

Also not terribly surprising was the way her previous injury had transformed into an aching fever after the strain of her confrontation with Lillith, making it an ordeal merely to stand no matter how she cursed her own weakness. For a long time she would be holed up in the station's makeshift infirmary, getting further rest and medication for her leg.

More welcome was being able to speak with the other patients there, to learn of and empathize with their own struggles and missions in person, for they had been out of touch for too long. Dozens of demon hunters and samurai were also interned there, and to her surprise not one of them begrudged Flynn his disappearance, particularly once all the Ashura-Kai converts began to trickle in and make their vows of allegiance to the Blades of Tokyo. Though they were treated with suspicion by Mikado's samurai, the hunters who had worked with them for cash rewards in the past stood by them for the most part, even as most of them elected to become scavengers instead of warriors when given the choice as predicted.

"Don't trust 'em", one of the older male hunters in the infirmary advised her, a large man with dark brown skin beneath his orange-white hunter armour. "They'll try to secret away anything they find that's valuable, sell it off to civilians at marked-up prices. They might be afraid of master Flynn... but he can't watch 'em all the time, and the bastards're used to lording it over everyone else."

Fortunately, she would later discover that Flynn had been one step ahead of her on that count. Already their scavenger parties usually travelled under heavy warrior escort for obvious reasons, but the Ashura-Kai scavengers always found themselves closely monitored by those warriors as well, watchers as well as wards. Much metal and wood would be needed to construct the high walls proposed to force invading demons into the planned choke points in Shinjuku, to say nothing of rebuilding its various arcades and office buildings, and with these new additions it could all be gathered much faster. Soon, every such party would be led by a strong samurai or demon hunter wearing a scarlet red-painted Demonica just as she and Flynn had worn, and she had temporarily yielded her own suit for that purpose to an older Luxuror samurai whom she had known growing up.

_Luxuror_, she thought in exasperation. Even after all that had happened since the gauntlet had chosen her that day at the rite, her memories of that time would never go away. Regardless of all else they had done, it seemed that God's heralds had done well in purging that divisive mindset from Mikado's people... by the crude method of silencing anyone who harboured strong beliefs in it. Months had gone by now with no reported sighting of Navarre nor his similarly-minded colleagues, all of them belonging to wealthy Luxuror families like her own.

_If anyone here ever claims that he and I cannot be together because he is a Casualry and I a Luxuror, I shall kick them quite hard, _she decided firmly. Still, such a verdict seemed unlikely to ever come. Not when there were far more important issues at hand than a discarded class system from a kingdom that no longer existed physically. Such as survival.

After a week, the doctor gave her the okay to walk freely about the station for a few hours each day, and she had known from the start where first to go. Flynn's favourite meditation spots had both been destroyed, but thankfully he had informed others this time that he had travelled to Shinjuku National Park, seated cross-legged on the shores of the river running through it.

"You should be resting", he called to her from the bank before she had even gotten close enough to confirm it was him.

"I _have_ been resting", she retorted, sitting down next to his posture and copying it. "I have rested to the point that I feel I may never rest again. And when _I_ am come to desire action over inaction, you know that something has gone terribly amiss."

"Ah. This issue again", Flynn sighed into his reflection in the murky water, slightly testy. "I told you before; there is nothing to forgive."

"From you", she acknowledged with a nod. "I've yet to forgive myself. I cannot earn that forgiveness by lying in bed forever."

He leaned back, actually looking alarmed at her now, and perhaps rightly so. "_Isabeau_. You are not weak. You tamed _Lillith_, something which even I did not risk attempting."

She smiled easily at the compliment, but would not relent. "'Tamed' being a relative phrase here. She respects strong women much easier than strong men." In all truth she knew Lillith could never be tamed by anyone save possibly the demon lord Lucifer. But she had earned the temptress' respect, at least for now. "How is our situation?"

Initially surprised that she would jump straight to such a matter, he drew back to the water's reflection and shrugged. "Middling. We have located sufficient food supplies in the Hills to provide for for everyone here for the time being. The walls are about halfway complete along the west and north sides, and the river covers the east." He waved one hand along the stretch where Kagome tower had once stood. "As you can see, we've begun efforts to clear away room for a field here. I've consulted with other Casualries, who agree that the land here is fertile enough for us to begin farming."

So her eyes had not deceived her and several trees had gone missing since last she'd been here. "That's all excellent news. How would you consider it middling?"

He shrugged, and she knew he'd saved the bad news for last. "Some of the Ashura-Kai's thugs learned that you miraculously survived Takagi's bullet. Some of them left to join their fellows upon learning of it, and not before spreading a rumour about that you are actually a succubus masquerading as a human woman. I felt you should know."

_That_ sounded so ridiculous to her she wanted to laugh. She was positive that Lillith would be, given the irony. "...I will live. Anyone foolish enough to trust those scoundrels' words over mine is not a person whose opinion I would value. What else?"

"There have been various incidents with the rest of the Ashura-Kai as I anticipated, but I have given Skins and Hachi- you remember him, don't you, that hunter guarding the door at Fujiwara's cafe? I've allowed them to punish any who step too far out of line. The worst was actually a Shibuya man who faulted them for abducting his children, and... using them in the Reverse Hills facility. He desired revenge and tried to gun them down. Hachi stopped him."

A depressing story, she thought. But not a surprising one. "I imagine you have brought up the fact that all of this was done under Tayama's orders?"

"Several times. They do not care. They only desire someone they can hurt, and so can ease their own pain."

There it was again. That particular pose that drew her so. A man, a young handsome man who had already experienced more bloodshed and difficult decisions than any human could be expected to, confronted with the very weight of the world on his shoulders. Besieged from all sides by forces beyond mortal comprehension, yet standing strong because he knew he was likely the strongest human left in the world in both mind and body. He would be the pillar Tokyo needed, even if it broke him.

How could she not feel the need to try and take some of that weight off?

Instinctively, almost without her conscious mind realizing it, she was drifting over behind him, tenderly drawing both arms down around his blue coat sleeves and beginning to rub at the most likely spots where persistent aches hid themselves.

"Mmm. Where did you learn this?", he asked curiously after several seconds, a sure sign she was doing it right.

"My father. Not for himself, not initially, but when he grew older it was something I greatly enjoyed doing for him. When we first came to Tokyo, I read a book on it to confirm that I was doing it properly."

He looked about to speak again, but paused with his mouth open when she had managed to abrade away a particularly bad sore from his most recent battle. "Ah... I do wish I'd requested this before."

"That is your sole mistake", she told him affectionately. "You see our warriors and civilians, people we know and care about die for the cause, and you try and do everything yourself to prevent that, yes?"

"It is my responsibility", he said defensively.

She shook her head, raising her hands up to massage his shoulders. "You are not alone, my friend. And you are not invincible. The next time... the price shall be 3 million Macca. And if you should fall, who will save us then?"

Flynn had no words for that. His eyes simply widened in shock, processing then accepting the new information. Not the figure, but the mere fact that she had visited and spoken with Charon as well, and come back from that place just as he had, was what surprised him.

"So, what is the right answer? How do I draw the line between safety and cowardice? How am I to know the difference between an active leader, and a suicidal one?"

A good question, and not one she could think of a good decision for. "Have you spoken to Koga Saburo and the others?"

He tensed in surprise, but did not pull away from her embrace. "Demons?"

"National Defence Divinities", she corrected politely. "Who, according to Masakado, have been defending this ancient land far longer than we have. From before the time the Firmament was formed. Of course, their advice is yours to accept or reject as you see fit. More than any other human, I feel we can trust you to do that. Draw on a variety of voices and make a clear decision. That is truly what makes a leader."

He mulled this over for what felt like a very long time, and as she ended the massage and stepped away Isabeau began to worry that someone would come looking for her and demand she return to the infirmary, ruining the moment, but no one came for them. There was only the stream and the trees and the bushes. Not even any demons.

"National Defence Divinities", he repeated, standing. "Who only served Tayama because he held their mediums, as I do now."

With a quiet nod to her, he removed five small items from his coat pocket. As with the medium in her pocket, none of them looked terribly remarkable on their own. Flint and tinder, a rock with so many winding grooves and nacelles it looked like a human brain rendered in stone, a simple bamboo stick, a disk-shaped stone and a collection of red scales.

It was easy to imagine a random human stumbling upon one such item and unleashing the guardian. And in Lillith's case, becoming enslaved or consumed by them. That was also the most likely scenario for how a wretch like Tayama had come into their possession in the first place with his men scouting the land far and wide.

Flynn stood staring into the gathered objects for a moment. Then, slowly and deliberately, he used the strength he had slowly developed in his journey, the strength that surpassed all other humans, to grind them one and all into powder. As she watched him do it in silence, he then cast the remains into the river before them where they instantly vanished.

"Now you are all freed", he spoke calmly to the clouds above. "Koga Saburo, Omoikane, Michizane, Tenkai, Yamato Takeru... I grant you your wills back. If you still consider me to be a worthy master, then I implore your continued support and wisdom. If not, then you are free to seek out your own destinies, and may we part as friends and never find ourselves at cross purposes again."

They both waited. Flynn obviously expected one or more of the demons he had just named to be summoned before them and then depart. When the image of the red-skinned Tenkai snapped into existence nearly the size of Lillith had been, he slumped. The others followed shortly; a bipedal general who looked to be composed of pure electricity beneath banded golden armour, a long-limbed deity holding a forked purple staff with bug eyes looking much like a pruned praying mantis or crustacean, the green-armoured fighter who had aided them at the Hills, and another in brilliant white and black armour of a similar build, bearing a sleek purple face mask.

They were all surrounding him now, so that she could only see his head. And clearly that head was hearing things from them that she could not hear. Listening and responding in minute ways to private words from the five, twitching almost in the way he had on the station rooftop, if not quite as gruesome to behold. "_Thank you_", she heard him whisper at last, swaying as if entranced. The five flickered, transforming back into streams of glowing particles that returned themselves to his gauntlet one by one.

"...Flynn?"

"I'm fine." Those beautiful green orbs shot open at the word, utterly tranquil, and she knew something had changed behind them. "I'm just fine, Isabeau. All that knowledge just... it changes you, that's all. You were right. They have all existed for centuries. Before the Lord's servants made it taboo, they were even referred to as Gods in their own right instead of demons."

"Just as lady Isis was", she acknowledged. "So were many of my own demons, before being given that negative label." In Lillith's mind she had seen the truth. Small wonder that they had all rallied to other masters, even to creatures as weak as humans. Even the demon lord Lucifer, many seeking his long-standing promise to undo God's grand work as revenge for usurping their power and worshippers.

Perhaps one day in the future, they would be able to break the mental habit of referring to them as demons at all.

Checking his gauntlet periodically, Flynn strode over to her with a new confidence in his step. "Isabeau... let us go. We still have a dangerous enemy to deal with, do we not? When you are healed, we shall begin."

* * *

Once again it would be the two of them, this time accompanied by a few of their other top fighters and their collections of demons in case negotiations turned ugly. "Promise me", Flynn gave his sole request of her when the time came for her final release from the infirmary, "promise me that you are not merely claiming you are ready because you know we cannot complete this mission without you."

Though it was a level of concern that kept her warm, it was also slightly embarrassing in the presence of so many other warriors who had staggered several times back to the front lines with wounds far greater than hers, sometimes relying on numbing painkiller drugs just to stand upright. In truth, the wound felt different than she remembered it. Not any vital organs, but deep globs of tissue and organic mass shed when Flynn had cut Takagi's bullet loose that were now missing, that were not replaced even with the use of healing magic. _Without_ healing magic, she would never have survived this far. _Still weak._

Lillith had not even had to be summoned to pounce upon such an opening, had not even needed to speak a single hushed word into her ear. Memories, imagination, and the knowledge that she still waited on Isabeau's gauntlet to be summoned at will were enough to piece together in her mind exactly what the temptress might have said:

_Demons do not suffer such crippling pain from a wound. Demon flesh is tougher, heals far quicker than fragile human flesh and bone. _

_As a demon, you would not physically age and become an ugly hag in a meagre fifty years' time. You would be far stronger than you currently are. Stronger than __**him**__. He would be forever __**yours**__, and any other man would also become yours should you ever tire of him. There are books with rituals that can transform-_

_As a demon, _she thought back at the imaginary apparition scornfully, _I would no longer be __the person he cares for__. _She could already tell that so long as she bore Lillith's data in her gauntlet, the demonic mother harlot would continue to try and cloy her and turn her mind with such offers. That, she had slowly come to understand, was simply what Lillith did, no matter what type or gender of human she happened to be consorting with at the time. That was what Lillith _was _now, and she could no more stop attempting to seduce humans to the demonic than a human could stop themselves from breathing.

_You will tire. You will weaken. Then you will be mine._

_I was very tired and very weakened on the Hills building rooftop. And still your charm failed, as was my intention to prove my strength to you._

_You do realize you're talking to yourself?!_

_Thinking to myself, not talking. I am arguing with the tiny, ant-sized piece of my brain that actually agrees with Lillith's philosophy._

_But it is time to stop doing that for now._

_Agreed._

Complete focus was required here, as the small group marched along the abandoned street leading to the temple of Tsukichi Hongwanji in Ginza where only a handful of streetlights remained. The last thing she wanted to do was miss ambushers in the shadows. "Hope he knows what we're getting into", one of the other Blades of Tokyo muttered beside her. "Every time we get near this place they hit us back harder."

"We'll make it", she assured him calmly. "We have a secret weapon this time. And I do not speak only of Flynn."

"Really?" The armoured man sounded interested even through his rough accent. He was another Tokyo native, a recent recruit from the Ueno district who had nonetheless shown great skill with all forms of guns as well as summoning demons with similar talents with projectiles. "Care to share with us peons what that might be, miss Isabeau?"

"You will see when we get there."

"I sure hope so. Nice hair, by the way."

The remark involuntarily brought her right hand up to a spot on the back of her neck that wasn't normally covered in silky dark brown. It had now gotten down past her neck to her shoulders without her even realizing it. She had repeatedly forgotten to cut it while recovering, or else found longer hair comfortable enough that it no longer mattered.

Back in the kingdom of Mikado it would never have been permitted of her. There was a strong superstition among Luxuror families claiming that excessively long hair on a woman was a sure sign of depravity or sexual promiscuity, and she had even witnessed one unfortunate Casualry woman stoned to death for such a thing. But now...

"...Thank you. Perhaps I shall cut it when we are finished here."

"I dunno. I kinda like it better that way." The hunter sighed, his mind drifting back to the unpleasant task at hand. "There's only one way out now, and it ain't pretty."

"Enough chatter", Flynn called to them from the front of the pack. "We are very close now. I can sense them."

Surely enough, they had not gotten within a hundred meters of the familiar temple of Tsukiji Hongwanji before a great wall of fire erupted before them, a second one flaring up a ways behind. The surrounding rooftops were suddenly thick with conical orange hats with matching robes and white bead necklaces. Demons were swiftly conjured by both sides, but in the end Isabeau saw that the enemy possessed far more.

As a final touch, a squat male Gaean walked through the great fire like it was merely thick mist, the Jirae Talisman hanging around his neck instead of beads and trails of smoke following after him. Isabeau could see the man had a great deal more black facial hair than any of his fellows, as though he had not shaved in a great many months. Though the long strands drooping down from the sides of his chin and mouth might have looked slightly comical, his voice was far from it.

"You must have a death wish to come here, false warriors. Or have you finally seen sense and wish to join us in purging the weak from this sacred land?"

No one else dared respond. Flynn merely shrugged, commanding his trio of legendary demons into a protective line around the others. "Hoy. We do not come to join you, Okane. We come to have you join us."

Everyone there knew all too well the Gaeans reputation for discipline and fanaticism, and still several of them laughed at that, the noise carrying across the rooftops like a mocking wind. It gave Isabeau more time to realize just how _many_ of them there were- at least eighty. Nearly half their total estimated strength. _Well Flynn did say the more of them here the better. I just pray this works._

"Of course", Okane replied sardonically. "The 'Blades of Tokyo', correct? That is what you call yourselves now? I must say, I have found these blades to be most dull. But what else can be expected of those who waste their energy in prolonging the inevitable?"

"Not inevitable", Flynn shot back lightly.

"Indeed", Okane echoed smugly. "We have heard word of your bringing the Ashura-Kai's dogs into the fold, granting us the opening we required to finally destroy the Reverse Hills facility completely." Summoning a pair of armoured Titan demons with but a gesture, he drew a stick-mounted blade Isabeau had read was called a Naginata. "Thankful as we are for that, you have now become the Ashura-Kai's leader, 'Mr. Flynn'. You continue to shield the weak from their just fates just as Tayama did. For that, you are our sworn enemy. So says the teachings of Lady Yuriko!"

"HAIL LADY YURIKO!", over half the Gaeans roared, their demons ready to strike.

Flynn drew back then, recalcitrant as if he hadn't expected this outcome. "Isabeau. It's all up to you now. Good luck!"

She was ready. Her left leg tried one last stab of residual pain to make her stumble, but she forced it to continue moving normally towards the space Flynn had just abandoned. Okane looked about to spear her on the spot, but something intangible held him and his escort back as she drew out her own gauntlet to summon.

It was just one demon. One was all they needed, and Lillith's size and twisted black shape was enough to make several of the Gaeans draw back in shock. Others who might have witnessed their master's true form before would have been equally surprised to see her summoned by one of their enemies.

"Servants of the Ring of Gaea", Lillith's reverbating voice began with only a trace of reluctance, "I am the Lady Yuriko, your founder and master. But I have deceived several of you. In truth, I am the demon called Lillith, merely masquerading as a human all this time."

More audible shock could be heard from every side, but Isabeau continued to keep her gaze resolutely focused on Lillith.

"Despite this revelation", she went on more contentedly, "I trust that you all remember the oaths that you have sworn to me and the Ring of Gaea. Trust me when I say that a demon of my power is capable of enforcing those oaths in some _very _unpleasant ways should any of you choose to break faith with me. Do _not_ test me! I will know."

Okane was pale now, contrasting with his dirty beard and mustache, but he was also the first to dismiss his demons and lay straight down on the pavement before Lillith, a gesture of complete abasement. "The... Lady Yuriko has returned to us! Our destiny is immutable! Nothing shall stop us from-"

"No." The flat denial was spoken with the utmost pleasure, and Isabeau imagined that in all truth Lillith quite enjoyed stringing a obsequious zealot like this one along, worry and confusion dominating his face as it surely did many of the others Gaeans.

"My... lady?"

"I will not be returning to you as Lady Yuriko", Lillith announced, turning from him to face the gather on the east side of the street.

_She's doing it. _Isabeau felt her heart racing, heat rise into her cheeks. _It's actually going to work. She can get them to swear an oath to Flynn! Still... I had best be ready to dismiss her if she suddenly says 'kill these intruders' or something. _Her hand hovered over the gauntlet, ready to act in the space of a breath. She would not fail. She would not disappoint him.

"I have searched Tokyo and discovered a human with willpower and inner strength comparative to my own", Lillith announced, turning slowly to address the west side as well. "I hereby transfer all of my authority in the Ring of Gaea- and the power of the oaths you all have given me- to this human."

Now they were angry. Indistinct, but growing louder until Lillith gestured and replaced it the noise with several forlorn howls of pain. "As I have warned you, do _not_ test me. I expect you to give this human the same unwavering loyalty that you have shown me... or you will suffer horribly for your poor faith. That is my oath to you, and be assured that_ I _shall keep it!"

It was working. The grumbles had quieted down, though Isabeau figured that just as with the Ashura-Kai, they would have quite a few deserters once Lillith disappeared.

"Spread this message far and wide to all those not present!", the tall demon commanded more grandly, actually showing enthusiasm for this. "Let the strength of the Ring of Gaea never perish! Human, demon, it matters not! Continue to fight, continue to struggle and rage with every last inch of your spite towards tomorrow! Only in that can you ever be truly free of God's shackles!"

"Not even using her demonic influence on them", Flynn was marvelling quietly behind her. "Mere words, but delivered with a genuine passion. Were she human, I might believe her to be serious."

"I hereby confer all of my power- and your destinies- to the human named... Lady Isabeau!"

_What-_

"WHAT?!"

Flynn's cried objection hung in the air with her own, but it did not deter Lillith. She merely turned, laughing at them all one final time before fading into dust.

Fighting off the shock, Isabeau tensed, expecting a declaration of fraud followed by an attack. None came. Okane did not move. They had all just now noticed that Lillith had done something to him during her speech that had resulted in either unconsciousness or death. The rest of the Gaeans, however, began to fall to their knees in the same fashion as he had, clasping both hands and bowing reverently beneath their orange hats.

"HAIL LADY ISABEAU!"

What followed was difficult for her to attach qualifiers to. Like when Lillith had plunged a talon into her forehead, the shock was simply too much to focus on much of anything else. When her senses returned, she found herself standing before the assembled mass of Gaeans awaiting her command as though it were the most natural thing in the world.

"Return to the temple", she said the first thing to come to mind. "I'll... join you there shortly."

"She got us", Flynn called from behind her when they were gone. He did not sound nearly as angry as she wished. "Even in the end, she got us one final time. Check your gauntlet's summoning app."

She did, and stared aghast. Only the data for six demons remained on the menu screen. The seventh had vanished without any sign of where she had gone. Reaching into her pocket for the medium stone, she found only a collection of tiny black pebbles.

"She got me", she agreed, letting it slowly sink in all that this sudden twist of events entailed. "She could have done this at any time. Why did she remain with us until now? Why did she follow my instructions until then?"

For once, Flynn had no answers. At least, none she wished to hear from him at the moment. He only drew closer, pulling her into an embrace of blue coats. "If she seeks to drive us apart as she did before, she will be disappointed."

"Drive us apart...?"

Frowning, he gestured to the temple which was already glowing with the lights of its people celebrating the return of their leader. "It works both ways. She has made you responsible for them, and I suspect you will have a difficult time keeping them in line."

She followed his gesture, not comprehending. Rather, refusing to comprehend. "I must remain _here_?!"

"Only for the moment." More serious now, he focused those intense green orbs into her as though she were all that mattered in the world. "Damnation. I should've seen it. Should've anticipated. It was the only possible way for us to defeat the Ring of Gaea without bloodshed. They would never have accepted me as their new leader, not without a great deal of violence. However, if you at least put on a show of similarity to Yuriko, that should allay their fears."

No. This was wrong. She had never wanted to be the leader of anything. Not their band of Prentices, not Mikado's refugees, not Tokyo, and _certainly_ not a group like the Ring of Gaea. "Put on a show?! My friend, I oppose everything they stand for!"

"I oppose everything that the Ashura-Kai stood for", he replied before his calm broke. "No... I apologize. That is not the whole truth. I agreed with their ends of protecting the people from demons. T'was the means and their attitudes about it which we took issue with. I am sorry. I didn't mean to dump all of this on you."

"You did not", she assured him hastily, glowering up into the night sky as if she could make out Lillith's mocking visage among the thousands of stars. "_She_ did it. One final act of spite towards me. Now I am _forced _into this role, unless I wish for Okane or another like him to take command and resume the attacks on Shinjuku."

"Forbid those", Flynn said as if it were not an obvious decision to make. "Simply expend their energies on consolidating power here and in Ikebukuro. Perhaps on persecuting your deserters as well- unlike those from the Ashura-Kai, they may yet be capable of causing great mischief with their demons and knowledge."

"No doubt", she agreed faintly over his shoulder. Even comprehending exactly how to handle such a role was giving her a headache. Only the memory of Lillith's talk of oaths gave her any faith at all she would succeed. "I would imagine that she has made it impossible for me to pass this over to you as well, even if the Gaeans would accept such a thing."

"No doubt", he repeated softly.

"My friend. I wished to stay with you. I would have gladly remained at your side through any peril. I... I..."

No good. The words remained persistently stuck. Would she ever be able to say it? Not those words.

So she came up with something else instead. "..._Vous si gentil_."

"I know." Strong, warm hands reached up around her neck, beneath the coat's collar. "We each must attend to our own responsibilities for the moment. And I promise to visit you whenever I have the time. We can share manga, compared stories..."

"...Thank you. I shall do the same. Acting together, we can create a new world."

The hands were lifting up the collar now, peeling her coat away like a layer of shed skin. "That shall be the most difficult battle of all. A battle without an enemy. But you are _my_ strength in this. More than demons, more than Gods, more than any other human. You have my absolute confidence. Whenever you are confused or saddened or angry, whenever you need someone at your side, I will _always_ be there for you... Isabeau."

Without the coat, things were just chilly enough to make her actually wish to travel indoors where it was warmer, but she understood perfectly why Flynn had removed it. It barred the temptation to wear it at all times in her new role, while in truth a change of clothing was the least of the concessions she could make to this new role. Surely, Lady Yuriko's wardrobe would have something else in her size.

The white undergarments and skirt would remain, however. No matter what role was forced upon her, no matter what she had to do to aid the people she cared about, she was still a samurai, not a demon.

"Thank you, my friend... and goodbye, for now."

Flynn waved tearfully, watched her go the entire way to the temple. So did all the other Blades, until she could no longer see them. She continued to walk between the pillars step by step, only pausing at the main door to the temple lobby.

The apparition was waiting for her.

_I am going to loathe this._

_And when has any activity been enjoyable with such an outlook? You must widen your horizons._

_Go wherever White Flynn went. Please._

_Not so long as you believe begging is a suitable course of action for the mighty leader of the Ring of Gaea._

_I never wished to be a leader!_

_Yet here you are. That's what happens when you learn how to make decisions and take responsibility. Clearly, Lillith saw something in you worth nurturing._

_Something depraved? Something dark and demonic and ruled by desire?_

_Something **strong**._

_Strong._ Because those who made the tough decisions had to be strong enough to stand by them. That, not his incredible prowess in battle, was what truly made Flynn admirable.

She would do the same, then.

"Isis", she whispered longingly, knowing that Burroughs was still online and listening. "Pallas Athena. Valkyrie. Kali. Jeanne D'arc. Dakini. I require your assistance."

When her eyes opened once more, the six had positioned themselves around her in a circle that she spun about to behold. Each looked expectant, as if this abrupt summoning was no surprise.

"I need your help", she told Isis. "I appreciate all that you have done for me in battle. Now, I require your knowledge to survive this new role. I beg of you. Please help me."

She waited patiently for their answer. For all of their travels with her, she had never lost sight of the fact that they remained demons, or else ancient beings who had received the same label for the crime of defying the Lord's will. For most of their kind, desire was the only law.

She shouldn't have worried. Isis seemed to be shifting her heavily tattooed eyes around at the others, taking in their affirmative looks as well before nodding. Whether demonic or divine, all six of them remained proud, strong women who would never have aligned themselves with anyone who had not earned their utmost respect and devotion, just as Flynn had to the even stronger assemblage of demons that he controlled, even the famed Nation Defence Divinities. Their trust in her was equal to the trust that she had developed in them.

"Share with me your wisdom", she spread her hands out to Isis. "I shall never trust Lillith, but I will always listen to you."

Isis smiled warmly, laid bright feathered wings upon her sagged shoulders as if a mother comforting an upset daughter, wiping away the tears she had shed for Flynn earlier. _We will always be at your side, master Isabeau. We gladly share. Take of our wisdom what you will, for I know that we can trust you to act in the name of the desires which unite us all in the same purpose._

_Peace_, she thought back. _That is my purpose._

Peace, then. Peace among humans, all of Tokyo's people unified into one goal. Wasn't that worth the sacrifice?

_Oh come now. Surely there will be some aspects of this that you might enjoy if you try to. You dread having a cult of fanatics worship you as a veritable Goddess?_

_Yes. Yes I do. They are **insane**. I am not a Goddess. And I've no desire to be worshipped._

_Liar. Without genuine enthusiasm on your part, this will never work. Let it go._

Three breaths waiting at the door, wondering if it was suitable to knock... _True enough._

_And Flynn did not merely lie about the Ashura-Kai, did he?_

No. She had lied as well. To herself, not to Flynn. There _were_ some people in the Ring of Gaea whom she had respected once. There was Kaga, a long haired warrior woman whom she had idolized for her courage and strength. Kaga's words would always remain with her, just as much as any demons'. A bizarre, impossible idea occurred to her.

_Are you Kaga's soul?_

Nothing. She already knew the answer was no. That was merely wishful thinking. But the truth was actually far better.

This was all _her_. She wasn't Kaga. But now, she had become someone closer to that. All she had to do was decide to try.

And in the end, as she stepped past the temple's mighty door feeling a resolve born from the faith and courage of six additional beings surging through her, she knew beyond all doubt that she would not have to pretend. Not really.

A king required a queen, after all.

Casting her wild, untamed mane aside, Lady Isabeau closed the door behind her.

* * *

_Side to side he swung. Shallow cuts, wide swings, parries and stabs were all transitioned into and out again in perfect harmony, without the stress that had turned his blade into something closer to a wheat thresher earlier, a farmer fighting to beat bad weather. Flawless rhythmn._

_So flawless, in fact, that he could not remember the moment when he'd stopped practising and gotten into the tiny cot reserved as his bed. The sword remained in his hands, working through its precise pattern as before, but all the background detail had slowly bled away until he stood in the white space once more._

"_You did it", a voice identical to his own called to him. "For now."_

"_Not me", he said as if in protest. "That situation resolved itself, really. All I had to do was help it along. The real battles are yet to come."_

_White Flynn made a rude noise behind a motionless mirror visage. "Battles? You think what comes next is going to be a **battle**? No. Not a battle. It's going to be a massacre. If you're lucky, you'll be the first to die, so you don't have to look at the results of what you've done."_

"_But not lucky for you." He sheathed his weapon. It was useless against this enemy. Only words could banish it. Words, and a strong heart. "That's not what you and your compatriots desired. I don't suppose you'd be willing to give me an estimate of how much time?"_

"_Sure", his double scoffed. "If I could guess the Lord's mind, I'd be happy to tell you. Not like it makes any difference. You're dead, pal. All that remains is how you decide to die. Will it be in the knowledge that you have accomplished nothing in the grand scheme of things? Or delivering every living thing, everything that ever **will** live, from God's shackles?"_

"_I'd be happy to deliver you right now", he offered. "You and the four who came before you. You'll never get what you want. You know that, don't you? No matter how many times you try and convince a human to listen and agree with you?"_

"_You don't know that". The wraith drifted back as if retreating, but remaining in orbit around his other self as he began a new series of drills as if nothing had happened to interrupt them. "If not the fifth son, then the sixth or the seventh. However many it takes. And **you'll** be there too. You'll be me. Speaking the truths you denied to yourself while alive, helping to guide the next saviour to their destiny."_

"_You don't know that", he echoed back._

"_But I do. If Lucifer's armies do not consume you, then God's wrath shall descend from on high and annihilate everything you try to build in your little empire of dirt. Mortals cannot hope to defy the will of both demon and God on their own terms. It is foolhardy to even try."_

_He said nothing. His eyes were shut, his sword fallen at his side. "Tell me. Do they love each other?"_

_At last, something to shut the pale replica up with sheer confusion over such a question. "What? Does who love each other?"_

_He spread his arms wide, feigning exasperation. "And you called me foolhardy. Whom were we just speaking of? The Lord, and the demon lord. Do they love each other?"_

_Even though the White's face remained frozen and impassive as ever, it was a true delight to imagine its warped mind wrestling with such absurdity. "...No. Of course not. Once, long before mortal reckoning, but so far back that not even they can recall truly. They are enemies, antitheses to one another. One seeks to preserve, the other to force change."_

"_Then we have nothing to worry about."_

_Noises emitted from the White, noises he was fairly sure were not words in any shape or form. "No. No. You're just winding me up. You and the bitch. You're too smart for that 'love conquers all' bullcrap. Human reproductive instinct, that's all it is. And hardly anything to challenge two deities with."_

"_No", he agreed, sheathing his sword once more, staring up into the endless sky. "I suppose I might explain. Carry this message back to your fellows, as it were."_

"_Please do". For once, his replica actually sounded curious. In that way and many others, he was different from those four nihilistic husks that came before him. There might still be time to save him, to show him that there was another way. Because after all, they were one and the same._

"_What we have", he moved both palms out face up. "Are two opposing forces of preservation and destruction. What we have on hand to oppose them are two humans with willpower nearly equal to one of those forces. I destroyed the Ancient of Days. I destroyed Lucifer. I destroyed Merkabah, the chariot of God, and even Masakado's dark side. And I've only become more powerful since then." Slowly, patiently, he brought the two hands together. "So long as these two forces never ally with each other as the two humans have... then we will win."_

"_They were right about you", his replica said scornfully. "You truly are mad. To place your hope in that weak woman..."_

"_The one who beat you", he reminded his mirror with just a touch of smugness. "Who slew the Archangel Paul. Who tamed Lillith and many other powerful demons, without the gifts I was given."_

"_Trifles!", the White screeched, wheeling around him even faster, now sounding genuinely angry. He'd only heard his own voice like this a few times, and it remained slightly disconcerting even now. "Trifles compared to what we've been through!"_

_But through it all, he only smiled. "Give her time. She's just getting started. Wait and see."_

_The wraith fumed silently, unconsciously falling down to whatever passed for 'ground' in this space. When next he spoke, however, his scorn was gone, sounding closer to a petulant child. "You can't know for sure. You're not omnipotent."_

"_Neither are our predecessors."_

"_They've seen countless generations of humanity rise and fall, all four of them. They **know** stuff. They **know** humans."_

"_I can name two humans that they don't know. Four, actually."_

_With that, the last of the fifth son's spite was gone. Had he been corporeal, he would have been kneeling. His next words lacked even the hostility towards life he'd put into every word before then, instead replaced by neutral expression tinged with something neither one of them could place. "The only way to know... is to wait and see?"_

"_Wait and see", he nodded back at the mirror. "That's it exactly. I no longer believe in destiny. The only way to truly know... is to wait and see what happens. And-"_

_A dash of dark blue cut him off, a splash of colour somehow appearing on his twin's coat, and spreading outward fast. "And create a different world", he finished for him._

"_Yes. One where humans will not be victimized by the conflict between light and darkness."_

_The change had crept into the former White's face now, filling it with healthy pink and one shining green orb before proceeding across to the second. "Yes. Yes, I can see it now."_

"_In the past", he confessed, watching in amazement as the colour began to fill in the other's hair with inky black. "Such attempts to create such a world on the strength of one alone have fallen prey to corruption. Many of their tales remain immortalized in books. Whenever there was more than one ruler, treachery and infighting was almost always inevitable as one or another sought to take the reins of power for themselves."_

"_But?"_

"_But... it is inconceivable to me that she would ever turn on me, nor that I would ever betray her. We share the same dream. We both care nothing for glory or fame, save to be used as a tool to inspire the courage in others."_

_It was done. The last tip of the ponytail had filled with black just as the dots of the eyes did, and he was now facing a truly perfect full-colour simulacrum of his own image. An image that truly **moved** for the first time, touching the extended palm of his twin, pressing both together._

"_Then let us wait and see the new era of humanity unfold, whether it would be destined for prosperity or tragedy."_

_The fifth son shimmered, and was gone. _

_But Flynn knew better. He would always be there, within. Watching. Waiting. Learning. Most importantly, unlearning the millenia of horrible nihilism his ancestors had laid upon him in the hope of making him just as they were._

_And some day, when he was truly born, their son would know a world without war._

* * *

A/N: Fastest story ever, yeah! Of course, that's probably because I firstly had half of it written before starting, and secondly because it's much shorter than what I usually go for. Maybe I should try for that type instead of long epics from now on.

Anyway, hope y'all enjoyed it, and thanks again to Atlus for bringing this wonderful game to American shores. I didn't want to go for a picture-perfect ending since this is the SMT universe we're dealing with, but at least provide a light in the tunnel, the chance that humanity might actually survive and become independent, and a chance that Flynn won't have to rely entirely on his own strength to accomplish that anymore.

Will update Ogre Battle soon. Real soon. Promise!


End file.
